Duke Rape Case: Haunt Me In My Dreams…

Ding Dong! The Witch is dead. Which old Witch? The Wicked Witch! Well… not yet but his reign of prosecutorial misconduct is “melting” away. Now if we could only get this eminent domain thing squared away and get the power back in the hands of the people.

If three innocent guys don’t end up in prison for 30 years, then a part of the credit will be due to bloggers like LaShawn, who didn’t give up, weren’t satisfied with the MSM’s portrayal of events, and were willing to swim against the tide of popular culture and preconceptions.

And that’s no small accomplishment for 2006, or for a blog, or for a person.

I think Nifong has too much pride to get kicked off the case, so he will exit before this happens.

Here is my prediction: Nifong will let the accuser know very soon that she has no case, and lying in court is now perjury if she decides to do so. Of course, she will drop all charges, and Nifong will say, “the accuser has decided to drop all charges”. Nifong now exits the case and focuses on keeping his job.

I also predict that he will fight until the end to keep his job.

One thing has puzzled me from the start, Nifong allegedly had a reputation as an honest man with integrity, so what happened to him?

Did he get his first taste of real power and went bonkers? Is he so wrapped up in racial stereotypes of black victims he became irrational? Does he hate Duke that much? Was he always incompetant but nobody noticed it at traffic court?

His misconduct is so massive, ranging from stretching the truth, out and out lying, witness intimidation to withholding exculpatory evidence and then lying about it multilple times… it’s hard to imagine anyone ever thought he was a stand up guy.

I support wholeheartedly Nifong being disbarred and removed from office, as his actions appear both malicious and done in the name of naked personal avarice, and I think the accuser really needs some extensive therapy (given that she’s made similar unfounded complaints before and sufferes a boatload of other assorted problems), but the best thing I can say about the Duke Lacrosse players is that they’re apparently not rapists (certainly not according to the evidence), but that alone doesn’t make them heros, either.

At best they were a bunch of dorks, real jackasses who probably did use racial epithets and made both women feel extremely uncomfortable, necessitating their leaving early.

I know, I know they were twenty, and twenty-one year old guys and that guys mature a lot later than women do, but their behavior was bad even by the standards of a bunch of drunken College jocks.

Yes, they were abused and victimized by Mike Nifong and it’s good that this abuse of the law, this prosecutorial misconduct is being investigated and hopefully remedied (with Nifong’s disbarment and subsequent resignation), but that doesn’t make these guys heros…or even good guys, at all, at least not in my book.

They’re a bunch of dopes, just as Kobe Bryant was a dope to ever have sex with that dopey girl out in CO.

When you’re an athlete, for better or worse, you have a big target on your back. That doesn’t make any of these false charges OK, not at all, but it makes them what you’d expect, given today’s lottery styled legal system, where perceived victims can often “win big” in court judgments or out-of-court settlements.

I hope the wrongful charges are dropped, but I also hope these kinds learn something from this – that bad judgment leads to little that is good.

And if they did what the other woman says, heckling them with racial taunts and raising a broom stick threateningly, they should have the decency to be ashamed of that.

Again, bad judgment often brings out the worst part in any of us, but that doesn’t make it OK.

These guys have been victimized by Nifong, but they’re not heros, not if they did even half what the other woman (who has NOT backed up the accuser’s rape charge) says they did.

kempermanx…I agree.

This is why I think Nifongu will drop the case shortly (before Feb).

You made a great point that if he is disbarred, game over!

Great point.

Lashawn,

You need to let tatercon and me know if you want to go to the UNC Duke game. It will take some work, but I think i can make it happen, let us know.

Kemp

La Shawn, I think Seahawk is right about you. Take a bow!

You have shown that while the MSM is still a (mostly) destructive force still to be reckoned with, their influence is thankfully diminishing with time. The Berlin Wall of MSM deceit is slowly crumbling, and you are helping to make it happen.

Many, many thanks!

JMK said: “None of these guys was admirable at all and Ill give you one good why Kim Roberts (the other stripper) who called the accusers story a crock, and said they were never apart for more than five minutes – her testimony was the most damning of all to the accuser, because Kim Roberts had no reason to lie about that.”

SteveDinMD: Actually, Kim Roberts DID lie. She called Crystal’s rape allegations a “crock” after Crystal accused Kim of participating in the alleged sexual assault. Kim, however, is a convicted embezzler and was in violation of her probation. When she was later interviewed by Nifong — who had the power to send her to prison — she recanted her initial story and then said that she and Crystal were, in fact, apart long enough for a rape to have occurred and that she believed that Crystal HAD been raped. Kim then immediately attempted to hire a PR firm in the hopes of using her story for financial gain. Months later, however, Kim recanted once again and said that Crystal WASN’T raped.

JMK said: “She also had no reason to lie about the reason those two girls left that party early she claims the Duke players hurled racial epithets at them and one of them threatened to shove a broomstick ‘up inside you.’”

SteveDinMD: Actually, Kim had EVERY reason to lie. After collecting $800 with Crystal, both women left without performing their 2 hour show — which angered the LAX players. It has also been specifically established that upon leaving the Buchanon house, Kim Roberts placed a 911 call and made a FRAUDULENT anonymous complaint against the LAX players, probably to insulate herself and Crystal against any allegations of theft arising from their taking the $800 without having worked for it. As an aside, since Crystal’s share of the money was never accounted for, there is reason to strongly suspect that Kim stole it, she being a convicted embezzler and all. Last, as regarding the “broomstick” allegation, you’re apparently misinformed. According to the LAX players, the two women complained about not having “sex toys” to use in the performance, whereupon one player (none of the accused) suggested using a lacrosse stick. No one was threatened, and no one hurled racial epithets, according to 3rd party witnesses. Why, then, did the women leave? Common sense suggests that, being prostitutes and having cash in hand, they simply felt at liberty to run off and do something else — get high, perhaps.

JMK said: “Her story makes sense, because these girls do this thing (stripping) for a living, so theyre used to dealing with raucous, high spirited young men, so something chased them out of that place early. The idea that they just left and sought to stiff these guys out of the entertainment they paid for just doesnt make sense at all and if it dont make sense, it most likely didnt happen. Besides, if she had no reason to lie about the other, helpful testimony, she had no reason to lie about any of that either.”

SteveDinMD: Actually, your theory does not make the most sense. First, you misstate the womens’ “profession.” They’re not strippers. They were hired through an agency for “personal escorts,” which is a politite term for PROSTITUTES. Therefore, the women do not dance for a living; they perform sexual acts for a living, which is well attested by the evidence. Crystal’s driver stated that he received sexual favors from her in exchange for car rides to and from hotel rooms where Crystal met with “clients” for an hour at a time. DNA testing also confirmed that half the human genome was pulled from that woman’s orifices.

All things considered, I believe the theory that “they just left” to be the most likely. Consider; a whore is not someone who loves sex, but, rather, someone who loves money, and who would sell anything or do anything to get it. At the time of the events in question, it was past midnight, the women had their money in hand, and Crystal was hopelessly intoxicated, thus making any performance terribly inconvenient. My guess is that Kim figured she’d be way ahead at that point if she just packed Crystal into the car and left. She wouldn’t have to work, and, best of all, Crystal was so wasted that she’d be easy to roll for her share of the LAX money and whatever else she might have had on her.

JMK said: “Still, you insist on indignantly lauding these drunken dopes as heroes.

That shows me you dont even know what that word means and people like you (people who call athletes heroes) are, in my view, a big part of whats gone wrong with this country.”

SteveDinMD: Actually, I said they were “closer approximations” to heroes than the vast majority of people associated with the case and the media firestorm surrounding it, and never did any consideration of the accused’s athletic prowess enter into my thought process. I neither play nor follow lacrosse. I never attended Duke. That said, I would care to point out that the three young men who stand accused face the power of the State, a truly terrible and fearsome thing. If wrongly convicted, they face 30 years’ imprisonment in the NC State penitentiary, where (extrapolating from conditions in other states) they would be at risk of being beaten, sodomized, and murdered. The risk attendant to a 30-year imprisonment are not demonstrably less than that attendant to a 30-year firefighting career.

JMK said: “And, of course, Bryant was no hero either. He was committing adultery, which is actually somewhat less boorish than what the Duke guys were doing…”

SteveDinMD: Actually, there was a little thing called EVIDENCE against Kobe Bryant — DNA, unlike what we have in the LAX case. Kobe also LIED to police when questioned about the incident. No, Kobe is no hero. I consider it more likely than not that he raped that girl in Colorado, but I don’t know whether I could convict him beyond reasonable doubt, since I do not have at my disposal the totality of evidence I would consider as finder of fact. Suffice it to say that there is no similarity between the Kobe and Duke cases.

JMK said: “I know this is going to sound overly harsh, and I may well regret saying it (as you may be a good guy who just went a little overboard), but at this moment Im truly ashamed that you salute the same flag I do, the flag that draped all the coffins of the real heroes I mentioned.”

SteveDinMD: Any of the 61 (by my count) fallen firefighters that you mention above as being known to you could just as easily have fallen prey to Crystal, Kim, and Michael Nifong. Would that make them any less heroes in your view? It shouldn’t. Neither should the outrageously false accusations against Reade Seligman, Collin Finnerty, and David Evans cause you to think ill of them. It’s well established that they didn’t lay a finger on anyone, and they were never even accused of uttering so much as an untoward word as the party disintegrated. Your post demonstrates exactly why there is civil liability for slander and libel. No matter how provably false a statement against one’s character may be, there will always be a segment of the population stupid or ignorant enough to give it credence. I suggest that you first learn the facts and consider them before you next decide to condemn someone.

#6, i agree with you; and have no doubt that nifong will “fight to the end to keep his job”.

one thing i like about lashawn’s blog is she does her best to keep (party) politics to a minimum: polite & gracious, lashawn – it seems to me – doesn’t go in too much for saying things like “power-mad democrats”.

that’s never been one of my great strengths.

nifong is a democrat, yes? try as i might, i just can’t recall any democrat in the last 15-20 years voluntarily resigning his office due to scandal/criminal activity/etc. william “cold hard cash” jefferson (D., La.) is just the latest example in the long line of democrats who’ve tossed honor out the window in their frenzied quest to cling to power. by any means necessary.

yetanother of the many reasons i don’t vote that way. republican politicians quite often disappoint/enrage/disgust me, but i’ll give them this: when a republican gets busted with his hand in the cookie/nookie/using-the-power-of-his-office-to-railroad-innocent-people-for-political-gain jar, they at least have the courtesy to be ashamed; and quit.

La Shawn:

I hope that your readers do NOT stop at Nifong as the guilty parties for damaging these young men.

“The System” is also guilty – this includes:

1 The entire “Welfare State” – created by guilty Whites, as so eloquently described by Shelby Steele – treting Black people as “delicate flowers needing special care and feeding”.

2 The resulting “soft on crime” – especially for Blacks – this has been documented many times by Mike Tremoglie and others – cops are actually more reluctant to be “hard on ” Blacks, because they have to face accusations of “profiling” etc..

3 “The System” is made up of individuals who have to take responsibility for this travesty of justice:

a The completely out of control guilty Whites of Duke – including the President of the University – who meekly remain silent following their initial apology.

b The legal establishment, who have NOT spoken out loud and clear until now.

c The Black people of Durhan who voted for Nifong following his shameless attack on innocent young men.

They are guilty of succumbing to class warfare and racial resentment.

“Any of the 61 (by my count) fallen firefighters that you mention above as being known to you could just as easily have fallen prey to Crystal, Kim, and Michael Nifong…” (SteveDinMD)

I don’t disagree with you that these guys were (1) wrongly accused, (2) innocent of all the ancillary charges that Nifong piled on and (3) very probably really good guys who had never been in trouble before and didn’t touch either of the women that night. In fact, I never even implied anything else in anything I’ve posted above.

In this long thread I must have posted three other posts condemning Nifong and saying “Anything less than Nifong’s disbarment would be a travesty in this case.”

Where we vehemently disagree is over (1) you objecting to my plainly stating that none of the guys involved were “heroes,” and that their actions that night (under-aged drinking, not all the players were over 21 and cavorting with strippers) were reckless, irresponsible and shameful and (2) your insisting that their decorum in the ensuing media storm warrants “hero” status.

I can assure you that on BOTH counts you’re wrong.

Kim Roberts (the second stripper) some of whose testimony exonerated the Duke players (she called the rape charge, “a crock,” and said they “weren’t apart for more than five minutes) also said the women left after some of the guys taunted them with racial epithets and one held up a broom and threatened to sodomize them with it.

It’s preposterous for ANYONE to believe part of Kim Roberts’ testimony without believing it all.

In fact, her claim of why they left early makes sense, while the idea that they left for no reason at all, does not.

I’ve seen Kim Roberts interviewed and in her 31 years she acquired two lifetimes more street experience than any of the Duke players have. She’s a hard looking woman, who looked as though she’d had plenty of experience controlling “frisky young men.” And to be honest, none of the Duke players looked like they could push hard enough to even back her up.

So what would cause a woman like that to leave a paid gig early and risk losing the money for that night?

Certainly NOT a bunch of drunken, “high-spirited” young men, but the things she claims?

Yeah, that’d about do it.

So once again, “Did these boys commit any actual crime they were charged with?”

Again, according to both the DNA and Kim Roberts’ testimony, absolutely NOT.

“Were their actions responsible and/or even decent that night?

No, they were not. They were already acting recklessly and irresponsibly and made things worse by doing exactly what Kim Roberts said they did – hurl racial insults and hold up a broomstick, threatening sodomy.

So we strongly disagree over YOUR calling these men “heroes!”

Hell, since the false charges have been filed they’ve merely followed the advice any good attorney would give – “Say as little as possible.”

Mike Nifong was probably hoping they’d say more, as I’m sure even he knows that it’s far easier for innocent people to talk themselves into a conviction, than to explain their way out of one.

So, NO, none of these guys are “heroes,” and their actions that night were, as I charitably called them, “reckless, irresponsible and shameful.”

And with this second post you make a demonstrably FALSE claim yourself, you say, “…and they were never even accused of uttering so much as an untoward word as the party disintegrated.”

It’s been widely reported that there was indeed a 911 call alleging precisely that; “As she was driving away with the accuser, Roberts called 911 at 12:53 to complain that the men were shouting racial slurs at her.”

http://www.newsobserver.com/736/story/459759.html

And there are numerous published reports of what the second dancer (Kim Roberts) alleges happened during that party;

“One of the team captains, Dan Flannery, using the name (Dan Flanigan), called a local escort service and arranged to pay $800 for two women to dance at what he described as a bachelor party. The women were directed to a white clapboard house on North Buchanan Boulevard near campus, where they met for the first time.

“One of them, Kim Roberts, was a 31-year-old escort service worker who was wanted by the police for violating probation in a 2001 embezzlement case.

“Her partner was a 27-year-old single mother of two, a student with a B average at North Carolina Central University, the historically black college across town. She worked flexible hours at Platinum Pleasures, a strip club, and for Angel’s Escorts.

“The women, wearing see-through outfits, started dancing about midnight. A photo taken by one player shows two women together on the floor surrounded by seven young men, many holding drink cups. A few minutes later, one of the men said something about using a broomstick in a sexual manner. The dancers stopped. An argument ensued. Using a racial epithet, someone yelled that they had asked for white dancers, not black ones.

From:
Files From Duke Rape Case Give Details but No Answers

http://www.gadsdentimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060825/ZNYT02/608250353

And there’s this account as well;

”Although she would not talk extensively about the party, she confirmed some of what the other dancer told police, including that the women initially left the party after one of the players threatened to sodomize the women with a broomstick.”

”The players’ attorneys have said their clients were angry and demanded a refund when the women stopped dancing, but Roberts disputed that.

“They ripped themselves off when they started hollering about a broomstick,” she said.”

Second dancer supports Duke accuser’s details

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncaa/news/story?id=2416623

Kim Roberts recounted ALL this in her 60 Minutes interview and like I said, her account of WHY those women left that $800 paying gig, is the ONLY one that makes any sense.

She told the truth about the rape charge (calling it “a crock”) and about their not being apart for more than five minutes, so it’s more likely than not that she’s telling the truth about the rest as well, especially since her account is the only one that would explain their abrupt leaving.

Aside from your juvenile use of the word “hero” which I call out on every occasion that I see it – “The real heroes are below ground,” – the big problem I have with you is your insisting on going further than calling these kids “victims of Nifong,” and “the wrongly accused,” and labeling them “heroes,” when their behavior that night was clearly and to be charitable, reckless, irresponsible and shameful.

And now you’ve lied, “…and they were never even accused of uttering so much as an untoward word as the party disintegrated,” to bolster a claim you know to be untrue.

These kids acted shamefully that night, as Kim Roberts correctly asserted, “They ripped themselves off when they started hollering about a broomstick.”

Calling that behavior and even their sensible (say nothing) behavior subsequent to the false charges that were filed “heroic,” is simply idiotic.

They weren’t guilty of any of the charges filed, and they weren’t guilty of “decent behavior” either.

And as for your first question, “Any of the 61 (by my count) fallen firefighters that you mention above as being known to you could just as easily have fallen prey to Crystal, Kim, and Michael Nifong. Would that make them any less heroes in your view?”

Those guys were made heroes due to their sacrifices, giving their lives in attempts to save others, that can never be taken away, just as it can’t be conferred on athletes or student-athletes wrongly accused.

Moreover, I’ve seen most of the guys I mentioned at their worst (when drinking), and they too could be, at times, “reckless, irresponsible, even shameful” (stumbling along the St Patrick’s Day parade route), but I’ve never heard one of them ever threaten to sodomize anyone, nor hurl racial epithets, while I was around them.

In those moments, those guys weren’t “heroic,” they were, at times “reckless” and “irresponsible” too, and so were these kids and if you don’t see that, THAT’S a big problem.

“JMK – you wrote a pretty long post tonight. Here is what I take issue with – there were 40+ young men present that night. No one knows for certain if the 3 men charged (Reade, Colin & David) made the racial remarks…” (regularjesus)

RJ, I’m not claiming that ANY of those charged uttered those remarks, although Kim Roberts has claimed that it was Colin Finnerty (“the skinny one”) who hoisted the broomstick.

Be that as it may, this whole scene was a bad situation and adding strippers to it only heightened the chance for something worse to go down. It’s along the lines of that old adage, “When you lie down with dogs, you’ll get up with fleas.” Well those boys were down with some dirty dogs that night…and they shouldn’t have been.

The behavior of everyone at that party was reckless, irresponsible and shameful.

That alone, doesn’t make them criminals and as I said, I’m glad the rape charges have been dropped and look forward to the other charges being dropped as well and Nifong punished for putting his own personal avarice ahead of everything else.

All I’ve contended is that none of these guy’s behavior was anything close to commendable that night and the three accused have done exactly the right thing (saying as little as possible) since, again, hardly “heroic,” at least not from my vantage.

” Actually, there was a little thing called EVIDENCE against Kobe Bryant — DNA, unlike what we have in the LAX case. Kobe also LIED to police when questioned about the incident. No, Kobe is no hero. I consider it more likely than not that he raped that girl in Colorado, but I don’t know whether I could convict him beyond reasonable doubt, since I do not have at my disposal the totality of evidence I would consider as finder of fact. Suffice it to say that there is no similarity between the Kobe and Duke cases.”

There isn’t–but your mention of DNA is off-base, as the issue in the Kobe case was consent, therefore the presence or absence of DNA was irrelevant.

This has turned out to be the “DUKE RAPE CASE THAT NEVER WAS”. This could make for a good soap opera. We have three young men who lives have been officially ruined for no good reason trying desperately to clear their names. We have a mentally disturbed slut who has been around the block more times then the ice cream man it seems. Then we have a megalomaniac District Attorney that pimped black racial rage and white envy to his own advantage. I’m going to start on the pilot episode right now.

I tend to believe the sex in the Kobe Bryant case was consensual and the rape charge contrived after the fact.

His behavior (adultery) was certainly reckless, and irresponsible and he paid to get that ordeal done with so he could try and mend a very profitable public image.

There’s also, in my mind, no question that the Duke accuser made up her story in the wake of a monetary dispute with the Duke Lacrosse players.

The cases are NOT similar except for the false rape allegations in both.

Another false rape charge case was the 2004 firehouse sex scandal in the Bronx, where three young firefighters, were involved with a young woman that one of them had met on the internet.

She turned out to be a woman with a long history of mental problems and when the guys refused to give her cab money home and mocked her, she alleged rape – the three firefighters were subsequently fired (over various Departmental charges), even though the rape charges were all subsequently dropped.

The similarity between that case and the Duke case is that in both instances, normally decent, hardworking males put themselves in a bad situation via their own reckless and irresponsible behavior.

They shouldn’t have even thought about inviting a woman into that firehouse that night, and the Duke players shouldn’t have had strippers to their place either.

Compounding matters, the three firefighters never should’ve mocked that woman and the Duke players shouldn’t have, as Kim Roberts attests, “ripped themselves off when they started hollering about a broomstick.”

In both cases, had the guys not chosen to act boorishly with these women and had just dropped the money issue, they’d never have found themselves fighting off false rape charges.

That doesn’t make either the three fired firefighters, nor any of the Duke players criminals, it makes them all guys whose reckless and irresponsible behavior turned a bad situation worse.

That may well have explained the last exchange of insults, Kempermanx, but soemthing else drove those two women out of that place.

What’s the likelihood they left an $800 gig for no reason at all?

Less than 5%.

What’s the likelihood they were driven out by something like Kim Roberts said (the broomstick threat) better than 95%.

Which one makes more sense?

The guys weren’t happy with the duo and instead of dealing with the service they originally called, they chased them out and argued money in the street with two street people – bad move.

There are numerous published reports of what the second dancer (Kim Roberts) alleges happened during that party;

One of the team captains, Dan Flannery, using the name (Dan Flanigan), called a local escort service and arranged to pay $800 for two women to dance at what he described as a bachelor party. The women were directed to a white clapboard house on North Buchanan Boulevard near campus, where they met for the first time.

One of them, Kim Roberts, was a 31-year-old escort service worker who was wanted by the police for violating probation in a 2001 embezzlement case.

Her partner was a 27-year-old single mother of two, a student with a B average at North Carolina Central University, the historically black college across town. She worked flexible hours at Platinum Pleasures, a strip club, and for Angels Escorts.

The women, wearing see-through outfits, started dancing about midnight. A photo taken by one player shows two women together on the floor surrounded by seven young men, many holding drink cups. A few minutes later, one of the men said something about using a broomstick in a sexual manner. The dancers stopped. An argument ensued. Using a racial epithet, someone yelled that they had asked for white dancers, not black ones.”

From:

Files From Duke Rape Case Give Details but No Answers

http://www.gadsdentimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060825/ZNYT02/608250353

And theres this account as well;

“Although she would not talk extensively about the party, she confirmed some of what the other dancer told police, including that the women initially left the party after one of the players threatened to sodomize the women with a broomstick.

“The players attorneys have said their clients were angry and demanded a refund when the women stopped dancing, but Roberts disputed that.

They ripped themselves off when they started hollering about a broomstick, she said.

When something like that goes down, it’s not worth fighting over the money. If it were worth the fight, these guys would’ve made their case to the service they called to set this up.

They should’ve just left the money alone, because that wasn’t the venue in which to fight over it.

Bottom line, these guys were as dumb, reckless and irresponsible as were those firefighters in the “Animal House” back in 2004.

Nifong will fly free like a bird when this is done. Count on it. This is North Carolina or more specifically the Durham/Chapel Hill area, things don’t work here in a normal fashion. The papers are filled with stories of corruption and accusations of racism. What’s that you say? The store is out of roast beef? Why that’s racism, if ever there was a case of racism! Any ignorant fool can see that is racism! So if you don’t see it and agree with it, you must be an ignorant fool or a racist! I can not wait until I leave this overtaxed, over littered, over racist, mecca of gaseous liberal toxicity. Funny thing is the libs blame the litter on the rednecks, but I am not so sure it is the rednecks. Want to know how they celebrate Memorial Day in Carborro? They light candles for all people killed in wars. Even the people who killed our good, brave soldiers!! Do you know what Chapel Hill did with worn out American flags? They dumped them in the landfill and there they stayed until a veteran found them and rescued them so that they may be disposed of honorably. What a pathetic place. It is like they have very little appreciation of the sacrifices that some people made for them to live in their little liberal bubble of bs.

JMK,

Come down off the pulpit. Quit preachin’. We get your point (Eight posts that virtually repeats the same thing over and over). Shoulda coulda woulda. Blah, blah, blah…

These young men are not as bad as you’re making them out to be. Enough already.

I would sleep very well at night knowing that my daughter or sister was on a date with one of these young men. Just because they have educated privilege doesn’t make them bad people. Race and class tends to breed deep-seated envy in some people. Hmm…

Me? I resent liars and ho’s. Crystal? She’ a Ho-Ho-Ho.

Merry ho-ho Christmas and a Happy New Year La Shawn, Tatercon, Seahawk & Kemp.

I’ll await your inevitable reply, JMK…

Tate

I’ve never “made the Duke players out to be bad guys,” I’m insisting (cause I’ve done this for years) that investigators KNOW that human nature doesn’t vary. EVERYthing has a reason.

There’s no dispute about the altercation over money at this party, even the Duke player’s lawyers acknowledge that; “”The players’ attorneys have said their clients were angry and demanded a refund when the women stopped dancing, but Roberts disputed that.”

The ONLY question left is why the women stopped dancing.

The “they stopped for no reason” argument is IDIOTIC, as it’s highly unlikely these experienced strippers suddenly found themselves overwhelmed with a new-found sense of modesty.

No, they stopped for some reason.

So, was it a sudden case of modesty, or perhaps as Kim Roberts (whose testimony exonerates the Duke players of rape) contests, a broomstick threat.

Only the latter makes any sense, given what human nature is. And the women were right about the money owed, as Kim Roberts rightly said, “They ripped themselves off when they started hollering about a broomstick,” she said.”

I’ve said all along that these kids aren’t rapists, and now I’m stating the obvious in saying that they weren’t saints, or “heroes” either.

There’s just no viable way to assert that these women stopped dancing for no reason at all.

It is not posssible for blacks to be racist based on the definition that racism is prejudice plus power. Blacks have no power to legisplate and perpetuate dominance over whites in the yet to be USA.

JMK said: “I’ve never “made the Duke players out to be bad guys,” I’m insisting (cause I’ve done this for years) that investigators KNOW that human nature doesn’t vary. EVERYthing has a reason.

There’s no dispute about the altercation over money at this party, even the Duke player’s lawyers acknowledge that; “”The players’ attorneys have said their clients were angry and demanded a refund when the women stopped dancing, but Roberts disputed that.”

The ONLY question left is why the women stopped dancing.”

SteveDinMD: Yes, there was an argument over money — because the LAX players paid the women $800, but there was no performance. Why, you ask, would the women leave without finishing their dance? They left because they had their money in hand. More accurately, they left because KIM had the money in hand. Even according to Kim’s latest story, Crystal wanted to go back into the house because “there was more money to be made.” If you choose to believe that part of Kim’s tale, then it really doesn’t appear as though anything terribly untoward happened inside the Buchanan house. Why would either of them want to go back otherwise?

I sense, JMK, that your analysis of the situation is flawed because you (as do many others) give far too much weight to Kim’s and Crystal’s various versions of events. Personally, I give ZERO credibility to anything these two women might have to say that isn’t well corroborated by independent sources. To gain some insight into what MIGHT have happened, you need to view the events through the eyes of drugged-out, thieving whores, which is an unnatural thing to do for people like you and me. My sense of the matter is that upon arriving at the house, Kim realized that she had no prospect of getting any money above and beyond her nominal $400 dance fee. She quickly figured that those young college guys weren’t going to pay anything extra for sexual acts or even offer any tips during her dance. Hanging around for one minute longer than she had to was, from her perspective, a total losing proposition. Crystal, for her part, was too drunk and/or hammered on Flexeril to realize this, so she was inclined to stay. Once the women had their cash in hand, Kim was going to leave.

Remember, too, Kim is a convicted felon, an embezzler. What happened when her former employer (a photo processing company, as I recall) left $25,000.00 in her care? She STOLE it! That was a risky move considering that most companies have systems in place for asset accountability. On that fateful night back in March, as Kim left the party she had a helplessly intoxicated Crystal in her care. Crystal had at least the $400 in LAX money in her possession, and probably much more since she had “entertained” other “clients” earlier in the evening. Upon their departure, Kim and Crystal weren’t heard from until ~40 minutes later in the Kroger parking lot, though Kroger is only a 2 to 5 minute drive from the Buchanan house. Moreover, none of Crystal’s money has since been accounted for. What do you suppose probably happened? I strongly suspect that Kim took about a half hour to roll Crystal and steal her money, after which she drove to Kroger seeking to dump Crystal off on someone else. This course of action would have been FAR more profitable to Kim than dancing at Buchanan for 2 hours, and would have entailed practically no risk. Though certainly speculative, this scenario makes the most sense given the facts we have to work with.

All of Kim’s stories since that time have amounted to continuously morphing confabulations of fact and fancy, practically impossible to disentangle. All we know for certain is that none of the LAX players touched Crystal, and, according to the next-door-neighbor, no one hurled any racial epithets outside the house as the party disintegrated. The argument was punctuated, however, with a racial taunt initiated by Kim and responded to in kind by one of the LAX players who is not among the accused. The accused are therefore completely INNOCENT of the crimes they stand charged with, and entitled to a presumption of innocence regarding allegations of threatening or outrageous behavior toward the two “escorts.” To conclude otherwise would be to play into the hands of the race, class, sex-baiting crowd that continues to justify this travesty by maintaining that “something bad happened” at the party without ever establishing what that something might have been.

JMK,
The Hookers arrived late, both drunk, Crystal got lost and was the last to arrive. The girls were so drunk that they couldn’t dance. They collected their cash, which Kim later lifted from Crystal when she pasted out, and got the hell out of there. Once the money exchanged hands, they were gone. Any excuse would do. The boys were conned and they knew it. Hookers taking advantage of Yankee boys, it happens all the time.
Kemp

Actually I give no weight at all to the accuser’s story, but I give serious consideration to Roberts’ version.

If you come out of a bar with a broken nose and point to some goon with reddened knuckles and claim he hit you, I’d tend to believe that.

If you go on to claim he “hit me for no reason at all, he just up and punched me,” I’m going to believe what is logical and what’s logical in that instance is that the real story is too embarassing for you to fess up to right away.

My mind’s going to consider the possibility that perhaps you made some sort of sexual suggestion to that other guy and he poked you.

Know why?

Because that’s human nature.

If you’d been arguing over Jets/Giants or Duke/NC State, you’d have probably said that.

No, the most probable reason you’d insist that you were punched for no reason is that the real reason is just too damned embarrassing.

And I’d tell you what I’ve told hundreds of others, “Dude, you’re not the first guy to get into a jam like this, but it’s better for you if you come clean up front, because we’re going to piece it all together from witness accounts and if you proceed with this and it comes out I’m right about why you got punched, you don’t want your family, friends and co-workers knowing about this.”

It all comes down to “what makes more sense.” You getting punched in the face for “no reason,” makes as little sense as these two experienced strippers stopping their act for “no reason.”

Same with the FDNY sex scandal – those guys had to have given that women, as disturbed as she was, reason for her to do what she did (file a false rape charge).

Their contention that she made up the rape allegation for no reason, or to extort money from didn’t make any sense whatsoever.

What DID make sense is that after she willingly came to that firehouse and did whatever she did with those three guys, she asked for cab fare home – about $30.

It’s therefore more likely than not that they mocked and berated her ( calling her a “whore” and “fat cow” as she claimed) and that ticked her off enough to make that false rape charge.

She was wrong for that, but the firefighters behavior was wrong too, even though it wasn’t criminal.

Like the Duke players, those firemen committed no crimial act and yet they deserved to be fired.

They deserved to be fired for bringing disgrace upon the FDNY, failing to uphold their “oath of office,” etc.

Seeing Kim Roberts interviewed, I can see she’s a hardened woman…a lot more hardened than any of the Duke players. She could probably eat up and spit out most of them.

SOMEthing made those women stop dancing and “thetruthhurts” may have it exactly right with, “So one of the guys perhaps makes an idiotic, drunken, (non-threatening) comment to the effect of “hey, since you forgot to bring toys, how ’bout if we use a broom stick on ya”.

ONLY that statement IS threatening, truthhurts, and it breeched their contract.

These boys were victimized by a false charge (as were those three firefighters in the South Bronx) and they were further victimized by a malicious DA bent on prosecutorial misconduct, but those things don’t exonerate them for their bad judgment, their reckless and irresponsible behavior and for bringing shame on Duke via their cavorting with stripper/prostitutes and engaging in under-aged drinking.

In short, the fact that Nifong is the chief villain here and that these young men were victimized both Nifong and the acuser DOESN’T exonerate them from their part in the shame they brought on Duke University – to wit, their drunken, loutish behavior that chased these women from that party and then arguing over the money after they obviously breeched their contract.

Again, like those firemen, they aren’t “criminals,” but they aren’t “saints” or “heroes” either.

Kemper, you should refrain from defending these boys, because your defense makes them look even worse.

If these women were indeed “hookers,” then the everyone at that party should be expelled from that institution for “conduct that brings dishonor upon Duke University” (cavorting with prostitutes).

If the girls arrived “too drunk to perform” and the players still forked over the money, that makes them complete imbeciles who deserve to lose that $800 (about $20/head is all we’re really talking about anyway).

But that’s not the case, there are pictures of the girls “dancing” surrounded by party-goers…SOMEthing made them abruptlly stop.

Was it a sudden case of modesty, or was it the broomstick threat?

Only one of those makes any sense at all.

Kidding or not, that broomstick threat breeched the contract and forfeited that payment.

Your defense amounts to, “Well they were hosting a party where under-aged drinking was going on and they were cavorting with hookers, but other than that they did nothing wrong.”

My response, if I were Brodhurst, would be, “That’s enough…it’s enough to get them expelled from the school for bringing disgrace to Duke University.”

There was no good possible ending to this saga. Once they entered into that altercation with these two strippers/”hookers” they were heading down a path that would bring disgrace to their LAX team, their school and to NC.

Same as with those three now fired firemen from the Bronx, sometimes you’ve just got to know when to just shut up and as they say, “buck up.”

JMK said: “If the girls arrived “too drunk to perform” and the players still forked over the money, that makes them complete imbeciles who deserve to lose that $800 (about $20/head is all we’re really talking about anyway).”

SteveDinMD: At least here, I think, you have a point. The LAX players were foolish, and perhaps naive. They thought they hired strippers, but whores showed up at the door. Prudence would have advised the players to not let them in, to give them $100 each, and send them on their way. Alas, they didn’t do this, but you can’t really expect 18 to 21-year-olds to have the same judgement and savior-faire as a wisened man in his forties. They were at the wrong place at the wrong time, and didn’t know how to elegantly dispose of the situation. The fact remains — they’re INNOCENT.

Alan Dershowitz comments :

“I believe in the assumption of innocence before trial. I believe in the right of every defendant to a fair and impartial trial. I believe in the duty of every prosecutor to seek justice, and not merely victory in the courtroom.

“I believe these principles have been violated in the actions of Durham District Attorney Michael Nifong. Elected prosecutors must be held accountable for their misconduct and the prosecutor in the Duke case appears to have withheld exculpatory evidence, failed to interview the complaining witness in a timely fashion and refused to consider obvious evidence of innocence. His entire course of conduct in this case should be scrupulously investigated.”

Actually thetruthhurts, if you really think about it, it’s her reason for leaving that makes the most sense. That’s why it’s more believable than the idea that they left for no reason, or just to “rip these guys off.”

There’s no way they left for no reason and they didn’t leave to just to “rip them off.” They’d endanger theior jobs with that service if they’d just gone around ripping off their customers. If they’d abruptly ended their act (without reason) they’d have breeched their part of the contract and owed that money back.

No, the broomstick threat makes more sense than the rip off scheme, that’s for sure.

Look, I feel as bad for these guys as I did for the three firefighters jammed up back in 2004, they were also all basicly good guys who got caught up in a bad situation (alcohol fuels a lot of these bad situations, as people do things they normally wouldn’t do when drunk).

I believe, in the firefighter’s case, no drinking was established through the blood tests and breathalizers of the guys, but they made a very bad judgment that night themselves. In fact they probably couldn’t have some worse decisions had they been drunk.

They had a similar story, one of them had met the women online, she begged to come over the firehouse, where she told them she’d had sex with over 200 firemen since 9/11/01 (right there they should’ve backed off that woman, cause that isn’t normal), but they didn’t and the upshot was a false rape charge and front page headlines for the next week.

She was quickly assessed as an emotionally disturbed woman and subsequently was invovled in a plot to kill her husband (yeah, she was Married) and she assaulted two cops.

The firefighters saw a chance to salvage their jobs by claiming she made up the charges as part of a blackmail scheme, but that didn’t make any sense given (A) the way things turned out…not much of a blackmail scheme and (B) her backline story, like Kim Roberts’ sounded better than theirs.

That is, the woman claimed that at the end of their interlude, she asked them for cabfare back to another borough (about $30 or so) and was rebuffed rudely. Sadly, this makes sense, as these are firemen and firemen aren’t the most touchy-feely or “sensitive” guys around.

Her story makes sense because it follows human nature; if those three dopes had just bucked up and given her cabfare home (hell, even half), she’d have probably been happily on her way, but no, they had to add insult to injury, by mocking and ridiculing her and she then did what she did – made that false rape report.

There’s a bunch of things the cops did in Durham that I just don’t get, because we’d never do that here. When that first cop came upon the two women in the car in that state, he administered an ammonia capsule to the accuser as she was passed out. That reportedly revived the accuser. He then asked her if she needed any help, if she needed any medical attention and she reportedly answered in the negative.

Me, I’d have written that up as “Individual RMA (refused medical attention), officer X takes up at 01:14 hours.” That’d be it for me, “See ya.”

I don’t know why he pursued that any further. To me that didn’t make much sense, but apparently they do things differently down there.

At any rate, once she made that charge, it had to be investigated, but ANY cop who hears three or more different versions of the same story isn’t going to buy it and would advise the ADA that this is “a bad case.”

Nifong apparently saw opportunity here and that’s why he’s absolutely evil in what he did. He abused these guys and the law for his own personal gain…hell, since he didn’t even interview the accuser for months afterward (probably knowing she was unreliable) he could also be considered abusing her (maybe she’d have dropped the whole farce had she been confronted early on with the basic facts and the possible ramifications).

Still, my main and ONLY point about these Duke players is the same one I’ve made time and again about those three firemen, they all put themselves in a bad situation through incredibly poor judgment.

Look, I understand how aggravating that scene would be, and the feeling of being ripped off making it worse, fueled on by all the testosterone of youth, BUT all that rip off was gonna cost these guys was probably about $20/head. I bet they each waste more than that on junk every three days at their age.

Same with those three firefighters, once they got into that situation, it spiralled away from them. They felt she was holding the up for cash and they didn’t like it, but come on! For $5 or $10 each they could’ve walked away from that nightmare….jobs in tact.

Same thing here, something (whether it was the broomstick threat) or some other major misunderstanding, where the women felt threatened, they stopped their act, the guys felt ripped off, words were exchanged and another emotionally disturbed person sought retribution in a false rape charge.

I know you don’t seem to see it, but BOTH those groups the firefighters of Animal House and the guys of the Duke LAX team had already exercised bad judgment that night and once the altercations over money occurred and the harsh words exchanged, the die was cast for both incidents.

Being a man means taking responsibility for our actions, even when we’re not at our best and in both these cases the poor judgment of some very young men helped bring a lot of shame – one group to the FDNY and the other to Duke.

They’re not criminals, in fact probably none of them are bad guys, but they got caught in an embarassing episode that spiralled out of their control…both groups desperately needed someone with a calm clear head to say, “F it! Let’s just cut our losses and be done with these girls. Let’s just get them out of here and gone.”

I like reading the posts of you and those I disagree with as well.

And to SteveDinMD, I am sorry I came off so harsh that first post, it’s just that word “hero” – I have a real hard time assiging that to anyone breathing, or throwing around as loosely as we all sometimes do. Still, sorry, cause I said some things I shouldn’t have.

Tate at 38, I agree with you — this most recent board has been filled with a heckuva lot of blah, blah, blah by folks who are more interested in not only looking at every single tree in the forest, but they’re dissecting dang near every one of ‘em to make sure all toothpicks are accounted for.

The forest? Wholly missed. The forest is that the rape charges are dismissed and it appears the momentum is on the side of three young men who are completely innocent of committing any felonies on the evening of March 14. Debates over broomsticks, 800 bucks, black this, small white boy that, sucker Dookies (I know, Kempx, you like callin’ ‘em Yankees…) — they’re all just toothpicks, sliced and diced from the trees!!

Let’s celebrate how the forest –this big picture — is evolving: Nifong’s, Crystal’s and the Durham detectives’ theory of their prosecution case is now in shambles. He’s got the State Bar’s hammer poised above his head, she can’t remember what happened that night, or even what she’s made up about what happened that night, and the cops have been little more than sidecar riders duped into going with the flow of both Nifong’s prosecution motives and the story of the ‘Ho.

So Tate, thanks for interjecting a reality check — there’s no good reason to study good news to death!!!

TaterCon

PS: Q: Do you know La Shawn’s spellchecker suggests as an alternative for “Nifong’s”?
A: “Fang’s”. No kidding.

Reb, good to see you on the board, and Happy New Year!! I completely agree with you in calling out JMK for his whopper, where he gave kudos to Brodhead for running off the lax coach.

As if the earth hadn’t been scorched enough by a self-righteous DA rushing to judgment without a lick of interest in checking his facts, the Duke administration felt the pressure from the Gang of 88 and decided it had to nail at least one pelt to the wall in the early going to placate the dictates of political correctness.

Sometimes it’s just pure-T gutless to play to the audience. And Brodhead danced to the tune.

JMK, you must be typing out your tomes with your old copy of Newsweek by your side…. I disagree with you on the importance of the McFadyen e-mail and the earlier “warning” given to the Lax coach. In the bigger picture now, those were toothpicks as well, accumulated in piles in the early going by the PC driven mob.

The brouhaha over the e-mail? You need to condemn the line of the movie out of which it came. It was not an original thought out of McFadyen’s head. The warning given to the coach? How easy is it to send out a memo on controlling “bad behavior”? Too easy. Much easier than assembling a study commission BEFORE sending out such a memo, for such a commission might have found out about their good grades, their 100% graduation rate, their Habitat house … all good things in a program run by a coach who had the #2 team in the nation positioned to make a championship run.

So, I stand by my comments on Brodhead — he was too willing to see the trees instead of the forest. He was too willing to let folks bring him selected toothpicks made from those trees, as well.

I’m not techno saavy enough to give you a link, but let me urge upon you and other folks a good piece over at TownHall.com by Mary Katherine Ham, titled “Some Good Things About Duke Lacrosse for a Change.” It’ll drive home just how much more there is to see in the picture than was earlier shown.

TaterCon

PS: I am the one yelling “Go to H-ll, Dook!!” the loudest at the end of the UNC Tarheels’ fight song. Still, that particular passion gets set aside in the face of injustices leveled against
the kids….

TaterCon:

I think you’re wasting your time on JMK. He’s bound and determined to soldier on in his crusade against the LAX players and their coach for what he imagines must have been “appalling” behavior on the night in question. He insists on this course notwithstanding the fact that there exists not one shred of evidence that anyone associated with the team did anything that night that could possibly have brought shame and condemnation upon the University absent the completely false rape allegations. It seems to me that he’s upset that his fellow firefighters were dismissed in the aftermath of that incident in NYC he keeps referring to, but I fail to see the connection to the Duke case.

JMK – KNOW what a hero is. I’ve worked with a few.

I’ve gone to, by my count, 1,917 serious interior building fires in my many years in the South Bronx, many of them fatal fires.

I KNOW heros.

JMK, the LAST group of people who should be condemning athletes for partying are NYC fireman. Yes, thanks for doing a dangerous job.
But the partying and drinking habits and abusive language of firefighters has been on public display far too frequently after 9/11. Drunken buds of yours jeering Hillary Clinton, arrested for assailing cops. Numerous lawsuits in NYC on various firehouses with racial frictions.
There was an incident of one drunk smashing the skull of a “brother hero” with a chair and several commanders going down in the cover-up in 2003 in the Bronx.

Please….

If you wish to get into collective guilt and claim that college students legally partying makes them all guilty, responsible, and culpable for the “non-rape”?? Then we can get into collective guilt of the NYFD in being an alcohol-abusing outfit that has many authority&discipline problems that contributed to the death of many needless dozens of firefighters on 9/11. Which stemmed from off-duty firefighters and non-dispatched forehouses violating instructions and showing up at the WTC instead of staying in Reserve, and of those that heard and refused orders to evacuate.

Don’t play that game of collectively condemning another group of mostly exemplary people. Not when your own firehouse is not in perfect order.

And your example of how boorish behavior by 3 firefighters “caused” a false rape accusation thus they share in the blame is ridiculous. By that logic, anyone less upstanding than Miss Goody Two-shoes “shares” in the blame for being robbed, assaulted, made victim of false rape accusations…and partially deserves it.

Nor will human nature permit some high faluting “uplifting” in human behavior leading to an end to college parties or firehouse get togethers. People will still want to have fun. As long as it is kept legal, it is best to treat college students and firefighters – as allowed, yes sanctioned to have fun.

And, if in the progress of doing that, something criminal happens, we should continue to be very careful to separate the victims from the criminal, from the bystanders and the peanut gallery of the uninvolved seeking to meddle. Lumping them all together as all culpable and in need of punishment is a very dumb notion at colleges OR firehouses.

Example –
The group of firefighters with a buzz on at a gathering back when firefighters were in their post-9/11 VIP phase had one excessively drunk member call a Bloomberg aide an ugly bitch and fall on his face. The rest were behaving civilly and supposedly the woman was being snotty. Her fault? The other NYFD’s fault? The whole organization’s fault? Firefighters nationally to blame for “firefighter culture and firefighter privilege”? No, just one lout.

Hopefully that is a lesson that those seeking to punish the innocent collectively at Duke have learned.

If you wish to get into collective guilt and claim that college students legally partying makes them all guilty, responsible, and culpable for the “non-rape”?? (Chris Ford)

Apparently you misread…I SAID very clearly that the false rape charge is a separate issue from their other bad behavior – under-aged drinking (illegal) IS illegal and prosecutable and cavorting with strippers, though legal, is still UNSAVORY and as such, embarrasses the school/institution.

And your example of how boorish behavior by 3 firefighters “caused” a false rape accusation thus they share in the blame is ridiculous. (Chris Ford)

Wrong yet again!

The three firefighters involved in that incident were all RIGHTLY fired for their “other actions” (Oath of Office, Bringing dishonor to the Department, etc) actions unrelated to the false rape charge.

Like the Duke players, their overall behavior was reckless and irresponsible that night and despite the rape charging being false, they deserved to be fired for bringing dishonor to the Fire Dept.

By that logic, anyone less upstanding than Miss Goody Two-shoes “shares” in the blame for being robbed, assaulted, made victim of false rape accusations…and partially deserves it. (Chris Ford)

Apparently not by anyone’s “LOGIC” but yours.

Hosting a party where under-aged drinking is involved is illegal and prosecutable.

Contracting with known “hookers” is also a crime called “facilitation of prostitution.”

While contracting strippers is not illegal, it’s not “decent,” or “morally responsible” either and as such it brings shame on both the team and the school.

And, if in the progress of doing that (having fun), something criminal happens, we should continue to be very careful to separate the victims from the criminal, from the bystanders and the peanut gallery of the uninvolved seeking to meddle. Lumping them all together as all culpable and in need of punishment is a very dumb notion at colleges OR firehouses. (Chris Ford)

Actually, what’s IMPORTANT is separating the various actions. In both the Duke case and the Bronx firehouse scandal false rape charges were levied.

The fact that those charges were false DID NOT make the OTHER actions of either party OK…those firefighters were fired for violating various Departmental Regulations and the Duke players are NOT exonerated, by dint of a false rape charge, of hosting a party where under-aged drinking took place, Nor the embarrassment of student-athletes from that school engaging in morally questionable behavior – engaging strippers (some say “prostitutes”) and breeching their contract with those strippers via a threat (the broomstick threat).

The group of firefighters with a buzz on at a gathering back when firefighters were in their post-9/11 VIP phase had one excessively drunk member call a Bloomberg aide an ugly bitch and fall on his face. The rest were behaving civilly and supposedly the woman was being snotty. Her fault? The other NYFD’s fault? The whole organization’s fault? Firefighters nationally to blame for “firefighter culture and firefighter privilege”? No, just one lout. (Chris Ford)

As a side note, it’s actually FDNY, as the Fire Department existed before New York City was chartered, thus the FDNY (FD first) and NYPD (NY first) because the city was chartered before the police dept was established.

Anyway, BAD example, in your case that ONE firefighter WOULD be punished solely for his own behaviors – violating his oath of office, etc, etc.

BUT in an off-duty party with a group of drinking firefighters getting into an altercation with some strippers, resulting in the same kind of false rape charge – ANY of the firefighters involved in the altercation would be subject to a Departmental trial, if under-aged drinking went on at that party, all those associated with that party (whatever firehouse) would all be subject to both Civil and Departmental charges over THAT.

The mere fact that the rape charges would be proven false would NOT exonerate any of those guys from their other bad actions. Your argument sounds a lot like the one employed by the three fired firefighters – “The rape charge was false and we did nothing that was illegal. Thankfully, those pleas fell on deaf ears too – those three firefighter’s “other actions” disgraced themselves, their Fire Company and the Fire Dep and that’s why they were all fired.

man! and here i thought I get a tad wordy sometimes…

What fascinates me is that while so many rail against “Christian fundamentalists” for their “judgmentalism,” (ie.,they deem certain behavior a sin) there is another group of people who would like their disapproval of the behavior of others to be conjoined with prosecution and penalties (loss of job, team, and place in college, for eg.). Couple that with the irony that the same “disapprovers” have labeled the notion that “sex should be within a marriage” as quaint and then insert sex into the curriculum of children as a recreation that simply needs safeguards. Heaven forbid that our youth should respond to the societal cues that they have rammed down their throat.

Tatercon: I’ve been a Carolina Tarheel fan since I was a litln’. Just another reason to like you so much.

JMK wrote: Today a DUI can lose many professionals their jobs on the grounds that, “If your personal judgment is so bad, how can we trust or depend upon your professional judgment?”

A recent story about a Korean-American investment banker working for Goldman Saks illustrates this very well. He was apparently sent to South Korea on business and in his off time posted on My Space that he planned to “bang every single woman in S. Korea, adding “Day four, three down, 2,499,997 to go.”

He was fired.

JMK, your reasoning that the LAX coach was justly fired because of something the team did off the LAX field makes no sense to me. It was not his responsibility to police his team when they were out of his watch!!! And comparing this to some psycho being fired for posting that he “wanted to bang every single woman in S. Korea “on My Space is really going overboard. Your analogy makes no sense to me.

I, along with SteveDinMD, think we’re wasting our time with JMK. He’s like the energizer bunny… He keeps posting and posting and posting and posting…

Some folks have warped and blind righteousness indignation, and if they ever serve as a juror can be a defendant’s and defense attorney’s worst nightmare. JMK, I hope you never have someone judge you the way you’ve judged these young men. Nuff said…

Well, Tate, at least he’s down to a 14 paragraph reply. That’s five fewer bees emerging from the hive than when Chris Ford and I both hit it with our respective sticks yesterday!!!

I’d like to see an accurate film on this incident as well Tate, one that makes the point that Tom Sowell’s latest column made and one that I fully agree with, “From day one, I have never believed that this case was about rape, about the Duke lacrosse players or about the “exotic dancers” or strippers.” (Thomas Sowell)

Dr. Sowell’s right, this case isn’t about race, and it isn’t even about a troubled woman making a false rape charge after a monetary dispute, it was about one man’s (Mike Nifong’s) engaging in gross and deliberate prosecutorial misconduct for personal gain.

That, of course, is NOT what this case is about to you or the other Duke “homers,” who insist that, “The boys didn’t do anything wrong…..OK, maybe some under-aged drinking and some cavorting with “strippers”/”Hookers” (to others)…but everybody does that, and besides, if the false rape charge wasn’t made, the other things would never come out to embarrass the LAX team and Duke University.”

To you this case IS about race (whites wrongly accused) and about restoring the honor of the three players (Finnerty, Selligman and Evans), the LAX team and Duke.

In fact, it’s not about any of those things.

Earlier in this thread, I took issue with one poster who alluded to the players as “heroes.”

I still do and I’ve seen nothing that would change my view on that. As I said, there are no heroes above ground, enough said about that.

A false rape charge does not ameliorate the other reckless and irresponsible behavior that went on that night at 1610 Buchanan.

Posters defending the players have assailed the Durham police (who conducted a fairly thorough investigation, found the accuser’s account unreliable due to her various changing accounts), Duke’s President (Richard Brodhead) for “failing to support the players,” even though (it wasn’t his job to defend the players, it was his job to neither condemn nor support until the facts where in and he was right to accept Mike Pressler’s resignation in the wake of the McFadyen email and to, at that point, cancel the Duke LAX season.

Other things revealed about that night and in that email brought shame to that team and that school and that’s why Pressler resigned and Brodhead accepted that resignation.

Like the Bronx firefighters involved in that 2004 false rape charge scandal, the false rape charge is a separate issue from the embarrassment the firefighters (in that case), the players (in this one) were responsible for brining to their respective organizations.

The 2004 FDNY false rape scandal was handled appropriately. The woman who brought those false charges has faced charges on that issue and some others that have occurred since, and the firefighters were held accountable for the shame their other actions brought the FDNY.

The inane argument that goes, “There wouldn’t have been any shame or public embarrassment if not for the false rape charges,” is completely invalid in BOTH cases. Those firefighters deserved to be fired for their “other” procedural violations. They weren’t “heroes,” despite weathering the false rape charge, and neither are the Duke players.

Neither the Duke players nor those two women were “good guys” that night. There were, simply put, no “good guys” that night.

Those who make THEM the focus of this case, are as wrong as those who make the accuser the focus of this case – they BOTH mistakenly make race the focus, when it is clearly, as Dr. Sowell points out, not.

The ONLY rightful focus of the Duke rape case is Mike Nifong, a man who deliberately used an unreliable woman with a history of mental health problems to inflame racial tensions for his own political gain.

Like the 2004 FDNY false rape scandal, there were no good guys in the Duke case. While ONLY Mike Nifong was truly EVIL, there were no “heroes” or “saints” among either the players or the strippers that night.

Wrong RebelPOW, those who think the Duke players were “heroes” are the ones who think this case is about race not Nifong.

In fact, they’re as misguided in their own focus as are the gang of 88 who inanely rushed to judgment accepting the charges on face value without any evidence at all.

If you believe that “Nifong is the only rightful focus in this case,” then you also accept the fact that like the 2004 FDNY false rape scandal, there were “NO GOOD GUYS” present on either of those nights.

I supported charges against the woman who falsely accused those firefighters of rape in 2004 and I support the current accuser being held accountable for her false charge, I ALSO rightly supported the firing of those firefighters for the shame their other actions brought to the FDNY and I see these Duke playes in the very same light – they (at least McFadyen) are responsible for Pressler’s resignation and that party was the cause of the media embarassement this incident has brought to Duke University.

The actions of those firefighters and these Duke players were less than decent and thus embarrassing to their respective organizations. Though neither group of guys may have been at their best, they’re still resposnible for the “other behaviors” that brought shame to their resperctive organizations.

The view that, “Absent those false rape charges, none of the subsequent embarrassment would’ve occurred,” is IMMATERIAL in both instances.

Those who keep on insisting that it is germaine or material, are flat out wrong and have the wrong focus in this case.

Let’s see, Mike Nifong took a rape charge that the Durham police viewed as unreliable due to the various versions offered by the accuser and her sketchy descriptios of her so-called “attackers.”

He wrongly took the investigation out of police hands, engineered an illegal line-up (only Duke Lacrosse players were shown, later inanely claiming “What’s a line-up?”) and refused to interview the woman for months (presumably because he knew she was unreliable), while he made inflammatory and prejudicial statements to the media (including implying that only guilty men would immediately seek legal counsel and say little publically) and illegally withheld vital information (the fact that the DNA of five other men, none of them the accused were found in and on the accuser)…Nifong used an unreliable accuser (a woman with a history of mental and emotional problems and at least one similar false rape complaint) and took the investigation out of police hands, made illicit and defammatory comments so that he could inflame local passions and bolster his fledgling campaign, by appearing as some “champion of racial justice.”

Does that sound like a guy who’d go quietly?

Does any of that sound like a guy with a conscience, or even a respect for our Constitutional principles or the law?

Nifong will have to be disbarred and removed from office kicking and screaming.

At this point, it’s highly likely that Mike Nifong believes himself to be some sort of crusader for that non-existant concept of “racial justice.”

So yes, that makes him “NUTS.”

Moreover, he’s the ONE person who actually can be proven to have violated the law in this case. Just another little irony in all this.

It’s about time President Broadhead grew a few! Or did he ask to barrow his balls back from the feminist at Duke who demanded them years ago?

SteveDinMD: Actually, the issue in the Kobe case was NOT consent, at least not initially. When first questioned by police, Kobe vehemently DENIED ever having had intimate contact with his accuser. His semen, however, was subsequently found in the accuser’s orifices, and this was scientifically proven only AFTER Kobe lost a court challenge to police demands for him to submit a DNA sample. Then and only then did Kobe change his defense to one based on consensual sexual relations. The case against Kobe, then, was at least several million times more credible than the one against the Duke Three. On top of all that, Kobe voluntarily paid a monetary settlement to his accuser after she brought a civil case against him alleging sexual battery. All told, the chances are very good that Kobe raped that girl, but the public will never be able to assess the totality of the evidence in that case.

***************

Kobe wanted to drive it home anally with the girl who just happens to be one of the biggest whores in all of Eagle County! That from Eagle county residences that KNOW this little trollop! Oh lest we not forget that he own boyfriends semen was also swabbed from her wet vage as well!

Kobe was screwed! In many ways. Do I think well of him, no way, he is just another expmple of a young and reckless kid with too much time and money on his hands!

Eagle county was the one that really got raped, and there again is a DA that performed the rape without consequence! He cost the county close to 10 million in ancillary expenses for parking lots, buildings and more, just so the county could host the trial. The trial they knew would NEVER happen! Why? Because the girl was nothing but another lying little whore! She was in school the next day bragging about getting porked by Kobe!

One needs to get rather local to know such. Kobe acted selfishly, well duh!? Married, rich, HUGE future, and some little girl comes to his room to phuk him decides she did not like it in da butt! Then she got real stupid, figuring she could scream rape! It went downhill pretty quickly for her after that.

***************

It’s too bad these 20 something guys don’t pack a bible around with them. Some of the comments here for sure imply they should! That is rather sad, kids need to grow up, and most of us learn some things through the school of hard knocks, these kids are getting one hella lesson you can bet. But some of the judgments directed towards their behavior as children/young adults by adults here is disgusting.

To those that think these guys are so different, you need to take a bit closer look at the state of our colleges and universities today. Really, this is NOT uncommon at all, the internet if loaded with stills and videos of all sorts of behavior that would send some of you over the edge! Oh and women groups are by a large measure much worse than the guy groups, sports involvement or not.

This is also one time that I pray a city, a university and a county as well as several individuals involved get to declare bankruptcy and pay money till it hurts beyond all belief! The BAR of NC is very lucky as well they are finally doing something, as their belated actions are nothing more than a CYA move as well. Theirs will be covered!

Nifong as well needs to learn “personally” what a Tarheel is and where it came from! Tomorrow would be fine!

************

“Using a racial epithet, someone yelled that they had asked for white dancers, not black ones.””

This should be a civil suit against the escort company!

“Virtually ALL LIARS follow a predictable pattern. They simply take the actual events as they happened, then MODIFY in order to diminish their own culpability, and usually EMBELLISH in order to highlight their own integrity/character.”
TruthHurts ??

Could not be said any better!!!!!!

*****************

For some true humor……

“The store is out of roast beef? Why that’s racism, if ever there was a case of racism! Any ignorant fool can see that is racism!”

You can’t be out of dark meat here!!!! I’ll call Jesse! HAR HAR!!!!!

**************

I keep hearing all sorts of things about bed knobs and broom sticks. Oh wait, it was just broom sticks! Or LAX sticks or sum such thing. Seems to be sitting on the floor between a floating joke that a drunk too wrong, to possible an offer of female “toy” replacement.

Why do I have this funny feeling that the replacement story holds water better than the witch mounting the switch run by a 20 something kid? Call me old fashioned.

Item A, the guys ordered “white chicks”, and I think even if the two guys that did the movie showed up, things might have gone better. But they were disappointed, then one of them is so phuked up as to not even be able to do the gig?

Check this out….. Primer pan loaded sir!

Pass the slur gun around, someone will pull the trigger!

……………

I do not necessarily buy the notion that they had their money after 10 minutes of attempting to put on a show and took off. There was some element of discomfort, race could have played a part, but for a hooker to cus white boys little dicks, well yeah that could begin an exchange. And thank yer great great great grandpa fer da cotten?

I can almost hear this happening. I’ve been in the hotel biz long enough to know that the only real problems we have is when our staff messes up and badly, or we do not fix a problem within 20 minutes, ORRRRRRR We totally miss the target of your expectations as a guest! You do that and don’t fix it? Well lets say the home office will be in contact!

Strippers and whores generally don’t have a home office, cash on the boobie, er barrel head and you git what we deliver!

…………………

Lets explore a bit that seems to have become lost someplace. Crystal was picked up in whose car? Kim’s. Via a call complaint to the police about Crystal being like totally passed out, drunk deranged, and refusing to depart the car?

Seems a hole has developed here. I’ll not say a black hole. (ok poor attempt at humor).

But the whole scene where Crystal was contacted by police, eventually ?arrested?, maybe just taken into custody, them eventually to a hospital and the whole who knows WTF actually happened there. Sans an obvious encounter with some other females at the hospital, nothing wrong with such, but they as a class have a reputation, especially when somebody other female mentions rape. They did their job and did it well. Right down to attempting to make notes of the several different stories Crystal told!

Kim does not seem to be around for any of this.

………………

“The Constitution was established to rein in the powers of government and the restrain the majority from imposing its whims on all the various minorities.”

True and it’s failed!!!!

“Blacks can and are as bigoted as whites…”

True

“and crime stats do indeed show there’s far more white on black “hate crimes” than there are the reverse. ”

Hate crimes are hateful, and quite frankly how much more dead can one be if murdered by a drive by that could not care about the color of your skin or some sumbitch that hates yer skin color? The very term “hate crime” is criminal! See above where even the constitution has failed.

**************

“MK said: “Same thing here, Duke President Brodhurst was, in my opinion, correct in saying nothing until the DNA exonerated the players of rape. He offered neither support nor condemnation.””

This a$$hole should be the second one behind bars for his civil rights infringement destruction!!! Today he is in full fledged CYA mode not only for himself but for the university itself. Guess what, his actions have deepened his problems, NOT lessened them! Good going Dr.!

**************

“The Duke University President was right to have suspended the LAX season and fire that coach.”

BULL SHHIT!!!! Can you say wrongful termination? I can and you will hear such again.
Oh Steve said it with much more eloquence than I.

“That incident, even minus the rape charge, brought disgrace to Duke University. The LAX coach had been warned to keep that squad under better control and this incident (even minus the rape charge) proved he was apparently unable to do that.”

Rumored or fact about the warning, was it in writing? (didn’t think so).

“He did not join with the 88 teachers who rushed to judgment.”

Comment by JMK — 12.31.06 @ 11:38 am

As well he did nothing to stop or censure those under his charge that did! 88 additional named defendants in a civil rights violation! All with high paying jobs and evidently way too much time on their hands. GAWD sometimes I really do wished I was an attorney!

******************

“Alan Dershowitz comments :

“I believe in the assumption of innocence before trial. I believe in the right of every defendant to a fair and impartial trial. I believe in the duty of every prosecutor to seek justice, and not merely victory in the courtroom.”

One could go on, but it’s beyond apparent that these three kids have been cornholed beyond any expectation of such.

***************

“But what about the prosecutors in the Tulia, TX drug case?

Comment by DarkStar ”

It appears we have another case that needs a bit more than a flash light cast upon it? Could it be that there in this nation there exists “ANOTHER” lying SOB with true power over others fate?

This the one? http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/09/26/60minutes/main575291.shtml

Hang a link, spread the word, the net is a strange and very powerful space today.

********************

“I always saw the rape charges as dubious, even most probably falsified, BUT that email (joking or not) was damning as to the culture of College sports in general and the Duke LAX team in particular.”

Amazing how folks tend to voice things when under some level of stress! You it actually takes some true grit, aka Guts to admit that frustration can and does cause us homo sapiens to be less than perfect at times. For some reason I still live under the assumption of free speech in this country. And speech uttered under duress is still free, though it may not seem nice, and especially not PC, it should still be considered as little. Oh and I’m gonna stop any e-mail as now and again something gets said that could get me fired!

As was stated, DUKE damaged themselves much more so than did these players or for that matter any of the other students that hired entertainment for their parties last year! See most of us really don’t give a shit!

Getting Nifonged? Yeah, we give a shit!

*******************

“As I said, the fact that these guys were wrongly accused and further abused by apparent prosecutorial misconduct doesn’t absolve them or the team from the reckless, irresponsible behaviors they engaged in that night, any more than the false rape charge against those firefighters in the Bronx absolved them of the consequences from their other and unrelated miscues that ultimately ended with those firefighter’s terminations.

Comment by JMK ”

Are you Mormon? Cuz you fer sure sound like one! Faith and salvation by WORKS, fark salvation and what Jesus taught us. He who is without sin cast the first stone? Why are you so intent on vilifying these kids, which in fact, are very normal and especially by the purity standards of today, for having a party? You are beginning to make me think you have some challenges in life. Best of luck with them.

***************

“Today a DUI can lose many professionals their jobs on the grounds that, “If your personal judgment is so bad, how can we trust or depend upon your professional judgment?””

Ask senator Kennedy!

*********************

“It’s release only inflamed prejudicial sentiment. I’d like to know under whose authority it was intercepted and released. Did a court of competent jurisdiction ever issue a warrant for its collection? If not, weren’t the author’s Constitutional rights violated?”

GOT that right!

**********************

“Hosting a party where under-aged drinking is involved is illegal and prosecutable.”

Then why was false RAPE charges filed instead of hosting a party with underage drinking involved?

It’s rather amazing at how much I’ve read and listened to about this case, this is the FIRST site I’ve heard about “underage drinking”! Hey JMK, propose something like prohibition as an amendment! GAWD that for sure worked the first time around, almost as well as the prohibition on evil drugs does today eh?

City Hall is ——> way!

*****************

Ya’ll know the events of 9/11 were and remain a real travesty laid upon our nation by whom?

I did not like waking that morning to see the towers fall in flames or the rest of the destruction of that part of one of our major cities or the crash into the pentagon either. 3000 give or take folks lost their lives that day. Most had nothing with civil defense, fighting fires or crime on a daily basis either. Just work a day stiffs that really became stiffs on a fateful morning. Sad as hell but very true.

The PC bunch all of a sudden labeled anybody in a fire truck or cop car as some level of super human hero! Guess what, they were and remain today human, I too feel bad that many of said corps lost their lives, some actually trying to save others in the process. I’ve no doubt that many did indeed perform some level of heroics for their fellow man that morning. As well as did many civilians did the same.

But to all of a sudden elevate 100% of police and fire fighters with said title? Well that is wrong and most current folks in the profession will state the same. They are servants of the people, they choose the profession they are involved in for a variety of reasons. NOT because they could or would become an instant hero because of it! They do it today for the same reasons they did it yesterday and for the same reasons they will do it tomorrow.

I heard today about some fellow that grabbed a 20 something and held him down so the 5 cars of a train would not kill him, while his own two, a 4 & 6 yr olds watched him. GAWD what a scare for them to see dad dive under a running train! Folks, that is a hero! Just one example, but a true hero!

9/11 was horrific, and many folks performed heroic deeds, and most of them will never be acknowledged for such. Doesn’t mean they will be forgotten, especially by those they effected or aided in personal survival.

Just to also remind us all, our govt, meaning all of us, have contributed very large sum’s of REAL money to the survivors of those that died on that day as well! I doubt the fellow today will receive any large sums of money for saving a single life, instead of dying in a building collapse. Do you?

Oh and the accused players are NOT heroes, but!, their behavior since being charged comes pretty close to some levels of heroic!

Had something like this happened to me at age 20? Well lets just say their behavior has been heroic, a true hero would have offed Nifong, a univ pres, and 88 more, then provided a good case as to why they push daisy’s today! There may or may not have been collateral damage as well.

*******************

“Hollywood producer (with Republican leanings, of course)”

Oxymoron, can’t happen, just wouldn’t be p[redent for any expectation!

…………….

#

Comment by Tate — 01.02.07 @ 8:20 pm
#

Tate – I like!

Comment by La Shawn — 01.02.07 @ 8:33 pm

Tate you can now retire! But make sure you get royalties!!!!!

******************

“He wrongly took the investigation out of police hands, engineered an illegal line-up (only Duke Lacrosse players were shown, later inanely claiming “What’s a line-up?”) and refused to interview the woman for months (presumably because he knew she was unreliable), while he made inflammatory and prejudicial statements to the media (including implying that only guilty men would immediately seek legal counsel and say little publically) and illegally withheld vital information (the fact that the DNA of five other men, none of them the accused were found in and on the accuser)…Nifong used an unreliable accuser (a woman with a history of mental and emotional problems and at least one similar false rape complaint) and took the investigation out of police hands, made illicit and defamatory comments so that he could inflame local passions and bolster his fledgling campaign, by appearing as some “champion of racial justice.”

Nifong so pharked himself by doing so. A real smart person in the know pointed out such today. By taking over the case, he effectively made himself chief cop and evidently dropped much of his immunity by doing so.

The link is contained in one of LaShawns links for info, sorry I forget which one and am really too tired to go look for it. JMK will though, for some reason I think is so.
**************

“This is a prime example of the old saying ‘Even a blind squirrel finds an acorn once in awhile’.”

And even a stopped clock is right twice a day!

***********************

“It also suggests that Duke may finally be inching towards supporting its obviously innocent students–a step which IMHO is about 9 months late; but better late, than never.”

Add 40-50 million dollars and we might be getting close to some level of understanding, oh and the commitment of 88 terminations, another million to the trust fund for each, and it’s even better. They are Tenured, you say? Oh and then Duke Univ leads the fight to destroy once and for all the nanyisim of Tenure across the USA! From middle schools to universities! Tenureisim is a thing of the past!

Teachers, profs, or whatever your bequeathed title may be, you have a single quarter, semester, trimester or whatever deal for a job! Mess it up, and you too are gone City!

***********************

La Shawn

Thank you for the opportunity to share a bit of me and my views with your esteemed audience. I’ve not seen this blog prior to today, and I must mention my personal disgust in not finding it sooner. But hey with 50 million of them, I figure that today was one very lucky day for me.

Your writing caught my eye/ears/senses. That works. I had no idea who or what you were, and did not care! but yes I looked. I will add that I am delightfully excited to discover a REAL woman and a real black woman at the helm. Why would such cause me delight? Valid ? The reason is because there seems to be so few blacks that are willing to actually speak truth about racial issues! Oh and for sure make sure they deride any black that actually becomes something in this nation without having some sort of golden/silver spoon.

Thomas, Condi, Collin, Bill Cosby! Bill Cosby has had more effect on my life and my opinion of a different race than any other person of color, (I’m sure you hate such decription, so do I), than any other black person in this nation! Yet it seems, the JJ and AL’s do their best to tear him apart!

Oh and like you, the term, “African American has no meaning. You are either American or you do not belong here! Period PS the end! (learn English, it’s rather profound around these parts! Como?

Reportedly the AV has now given birth to a baby
girl :

http://www.wral.com/

If the child is not premature, this would put conception back around April 11.

17 Duke economics professors accost Nifong :

http://durhamwonderland.blogspot.com/2007/01/dukes-economics-department-takes-its.html

We, the undersigned Economics Department faculty members at Duke University. . .

(snip)

1) In light of recent events detailed in court proceedings, it appears that there were a number of irregular acts committed by members of the Durham law enforcement agencies and District Attorney’s Office. We join with President Brodhead in calling for an investigation of those acts, inimical to students at our university.

2) We welcome all members of the lacrosse team, and all student athletes, as we do all our students as fellow members of the Duke community, to the classes we teach and the activities we sponsor.

Signed:

OK, many of you know that I talk to one of the NC Bar Counselors(for non
NC residents there are only 32 in the state and they rule the State Bar) which sent the latest complaint against Nifungu.

After many drinks I found out that I have been wrong in the time line here.

First, the good news, my friend is on the grievance committee, more charges are coming.

Bad news, I thought that at the Jan 16-18 meeting that the Bar would start the disbarment proceedings.

Wrong.

Nifungu has at least 90 days, with extensions, to drag out the hearing on his charges, which will be tried by 3 people, 2 bar members and one appointed by the governor.

This could go on for close to a year, with all the appeals. REMEMBER. these people get paid by the hour.

The last good news is that my friend thinks Nifungu may surrender his license instead of facing a trial.

At any rate, bottom line, Nifungu is Toast, only question is when he coming out of the toaster.

Kemp

Kempermax wrote in #100:

REMEMBER. these people get paid by the hour.

Kemp? No disrespect, but ANY of us who have dealt with lawyers on even the most causal basis could never forget this fact.

And yes, TaterCon, that was a shot against lawyers. I owe you some BBQ sauce.

thanks for the links, the Ham video is priceless. I went to Duke’s website and ordered a Lacrosse T-shirt after seeing it in the video. I’m sure it looks better on her, but I just had to have one as a show of support.

“Nifungu is Toast, only question is when he coming out of the toaster.”

kempermanx, this line is a classic! I’m going to have to remember it.

A reply to StevedinMD:

The point I was really trying to make about Kobe is the point of focus again on an out of control DA or for that matter justice system.

“Eagle county was the one that really got raped, and there again is a DA that prosecuted the rape without consequence! He cost the county close to 10 million in ancillary expenses for parking lots, buildings and more, just so the county could host the trial. The trial they knew would NEVER happen! Why? Because the girl was nothing but another lying little whore! She was in school the next day bragging about getting porked by Kobe! ”

The facts and numbers of false accusations can stand on their own merit and in today’s current environment any male is rather screwed from the outset! I don’t attach misogynistic views to such as there are ample cases that do, others can do as they wish. But that is NOT the purpose of this thread, seemed to make sense to mention it as I wrote above.

SMD said: “We who defend the Duke Three do so not to trivialize rape or advance misogyny, but, rather, do so in the defense of justice and reason.”

I agree with such as well.

I also believe we need to continue the dialog into preventing a bunch of this in the first place. Only by discussion and keeping things on the table can further changes be made. While I’m at it, either disclose all parties names or keep them all silent while due process is being investigated and prosecuted until a time when final judgment is passed.

I’m not up on the BBQ sauce item, but I keep it around, if I run out I make more as needed. I’m sure anybody making it through my post for sure has earned a bucket of it!

You can severely reduce your chances of having a false accusation of rape leveled against you if you don’t hire strange women to come to your house and take their clothes off for money.

Right. And by this logic the Scottsboro boys, who broke the law when they illegally rode the rails and then got accused of rape, should have taken the bus–you associate with a better class of people there than those who ride the rails.

And all those women who dressed in a way so as to be enticing to men (short skirts?) should have known it was only their own fault if they got raped as a consequence.

And of course since women never lie about rape, we have to assume the Scottsboro boys were guilty, anyway.

Rather, you can severely reduce your chances of having a false accusation of rape leveled against you if there is an honest DA, a watchdog press, and a stripper who doesn’t have a criminal record, a problem with drug abuse, a history of lying to get out of trouble (including a prior false accusation of gang rape) and a relationship with the police which allows her to operate with impunity.

But then again, we’re talking Durham here. So maybe add one more : if you don’t venture over the county line, your chances of being caught and falsely prosecuted by the DPD are much reduced.

Kemp, what do you think will happen in Durham if Nifong is removed? Will there be massive cries of racism and will the usual suspects, Jesse, Al and company, come for a demonstration of sorts?