| Blog and Media Roundup - Thursday, Jan 29, 2009; News Roundup | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Jan 29 2009, 06:06 AM (505 Views) | |
| abb | Jan 29 2009, 06:06 AM Post #1 |
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http://heraldsun.southernheadlines.com/durham/4-1083129.cfm Officials hearing paving questions By Ray Gronberg : The Herald-Sun gronberg@heraldsun.com Jan 29, 2009 DURHAM -- City officials are starting to get questions about their decision to risk delaying some of the street-paving work they promised residents while campaigning for a 2007 bond issue so they can first attend to a street in North-East Central Durham. Kersey Court resident Greg Hudgins wants answers from officials about when the Public Works Department will pave a tenth-of-a-mile-long stretch of South Park Drive that helps links his small subdivision to N.C. 54. The dirt road was one of seven officials listed as likely beneficiaries of a $20 million, 2007 paving bond. The city reserved $2 million of the bond to pave dirt streets. "Our expectation was that it was going to get done," Hudgins said on Wednesday, after trading messages with city officials. "We're still interested in having it done if we can." But Public Works Director Katie Kalb acknowledged that South Park Drive got pushed down the list when former City Manager Patrick Baker agreed to give a different project, a quarter-mile-long stretch of Harvard Avenue, first dibs on the $2 million dirt-street reserve. Baker's move responded to prodding from Mayor Bill Bell and North-East Central Durham activists. The Harvard Avenue project was not, however, one of the ones city leaders said during the 2007 bond campaign would benefit from the money. Now, the work on South Park appears likely to be delayed unless the City Council supplements the 2007 bond with a cash allocation for dirt-street work in its 2009-10 capital construction program. "It's not going to be done with the $2 million" from 2007, Kalb said. "It falls short of that. But if we got additional funds, it's probably the next one on the list." The 2007 allocation for dirt streets appears likely to cover only the Harvard Avenue project, plus paving on Swansea Street, Drake Avenue and Red Oak Avenue, Kalb said. The 2007 bond also provided $15 million to repave hard-surface streets and $3 million to repair sidewalks. None of that money is presently available for work on dirt streets. Kalb said Public Works officials are putting the finishing touches on their 2009-10 capital request. They will include a request for more money for dirt streets. Baker's successor, City Manager Tom Bonfield, will decide which ones to include in his budget proposal this spring. The Harvard Avenue project targets a stretch of road between South Benjamine Street and North Miami Boulevard. North-East Central activists say the lack of paving on that part of Harvard contributes to blight in the predominantly black neighborhood. But they've been unable to convince the leaders of the Greater Emanuel Temple of Grace to sign a paving petition. Petitioners have to contribute financially to paving work. The South Park Drive project, like the other six on the 2007 bond list, is a petition project. It was not clear as of Wednesday why it wasn't paved when the subdivisions around it sprang up over the last few decades, as local officials normally force developers to install infrastructure like streets, water and sewer as they build new neighborhoods. |
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| abb | Jan 29 2009, 06:06 AM Post #2 |
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http://heraldsun.southernheadlines.com/durham/4-1083113.cfm Bomb threat shutters courts By KEITH UPCHURCH : The Herald-Sun kupchurch@heraldsun.com Jan 29, 2009 DURHAM -- A bomb threat forced the evacuation of the Durham County Judicial Building Wednesday morning, delaying court and creating huge lines of people waiting to get inside after the threatened explosion failed to occur. The telephoned threat was received shortly after 8 a.m. at the courthouse. The caller said a bomb would explode there at 9 a.m. Detectives traced the call to a convenience store pay phone, according to Lt. Stan Harris of the Durham County Sheriff's Investigations Division. The sheriff's forensics team rushed to the scene, but the suspect was gone. They examined the phone, but weren't able to get fingerprints, Harris said. Harris said the caller sounded like a man. "It appeared to be a male voice. The voice sounded like it might have been up in age, maybe in his 40s,' he said. An estimated 40-50 people, mostly courthouse employees, were evacuated for nearly 90 minutes while the sheriff's bomb squad and bomb-sniffing dog searched all floors of the building and found nothing suspicious, Harris said. By the time the courthouse reopened at 9:30 a.m., a crowd estimated at 400-500 people waited at the two main entrances -- on Main and Parrish streets -- to get inside. Deputies had to search everyone for weapons, which created sluggish movement of the lines. The threat delayed the start of court about an hour, according to Sheila Eason, legal assistant to District Attorney Tracey Cline. Among those waiting in the chilly, misty morning were a man in a wheelchair and a woman with two toddlers in a stroller. But by about 10:30 a.m., the lines were gone. "The good thing was that court was not fully in session [when the call came in], so we could get everybody out and hold those who hadn't come in outside,' Harris said. "For the most part, it ran very smoothly.' "I've gone through a lot of these [threats], but you have to take them seriously, because you never know,' Harris said. "We're going to take them all seriously.' He said the bomb-sniffing dog was just outside the building when the threat came in. "The dog's handler was in the building, so he was able to get the dog fast," Harris said. "The dog came in and did a good scan.' Harris said sheriff's investigators also got help from Durham police. He said he's been in touch with anti-terrorism task forces at the State Bureau of Investigation and the FBI. "We just let them know everything's OK,' he said. Harris said he learned that a bomb threat was made on Tuesday to the Cumberland County Courthouse. "They had a similar call, but I don't know if it's connected.' Harris said anyone with information about a suspicious person at or near the convenience store pay phone about 8 a.m. Wednesday can call him at 730-5068. |
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| abb | Jan 29 2009, 06:09 AM Post #3 |
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http://heraldsun.southernheadlines.com/durham/4-1083115.cfm Habitual felon jailed after home invasion By KEITH UPCHURCH : The Herald-Sun kupchurch@heraldsun.com Jan 29, 2009 DURHAM -- Police arrested a Roxboro man who was on parole after an early-morning home invasion in southern Durham that led a terrified family to hide in their bathroom. Officers responded to a break-in call on Meadhall Court at 3:15 a.m. Wednesday, according to police spokeswoman Kammie Michael. Police were told that a man had entered the house and that the residents -- a man, woman and young child -- were hiding in the bathroom. The man banged on the front door repeatedly and yelled before breaking into the house. When officers arrived, they found a red Chevrolet pickup truck wedged between two trees across the street from the house. The truck was unoccupied, but it was still running and the lights were on. It appeared the truck had also damaged a mailbox and a cable box, Michael said. Officers entered the house and discovered that the suspect had barricaded himself in a bedroom by pushing a dresser against a door, refusing to come out when ordered to do so by officers. Police kicked in the bedroom door and ordered the man to the ground. When he failed to comply, officers used a Taser on him and took him into custody. There were no serious injuries, Michael said. The man, identified as Jason Harold Foster, 37, was charged with three counts of second-degree kidnapping, one count of first-degree burglary, possession of cocaine, possession of drug paraphernalia, damage to property and resisting, delaying and obstructing officers. Foster remained in the Durham County Jail on Wednesday under a $200,000 bond. According to a N.C. Department of Correction Web site, Foster has been convicted of a series of DWIs, drug possession, break-ins, prison escape, assault on a female, common law robbery and driving with a revoked license. He was on parole on a conviction of being a habitual felon, and was scheduled to have his case reviewed on Monday. How the hell can a "habitual felon" be on parole?!?!?! Only in Durm and with the NC "justice system! |
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| abb | Jan 29 2009, 06:11 AM Post #4 |
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http://heraldsun.southernheadlines.com/orange/10-1083130.cfm When does HATE become a CRIME? BY DANIEL GOLDBERG : The Herald-Sun dgoldberg@heraldsun.com Jan 29, 2009 CHAPEL HILL -- On the morning of Nov. 5, many students on North Carolina campuses awoke to an afterglow of optimism and unencumbered joy. President Barack Obama laid claim to the White House the night before, a landmark in American race relations made possible, at least in part, by the mobilization of young voters. At N.C. State, however, there was a different emotion added to the mix. Hundreds of students were angered by racist statements painted in the university's Free Expression Tunnel, statements such as "Let's shoot that n..... in the head!" and the letters "KKK" that seemed to target Obama, but also cast a shadow of fear across campus. Some students, afraid that the slogans were a call to violence, left their "Obama" buttons at home. In the months since November, the incident at the Free Expression Tunnel has retained its divisive power in a different way. UNC President Erskine Bowles formed a study commission to formulate recommendations as to whether the university system should adopt student conduct policies addressing hate crimes. That commission is also discussing whether to institute diversity training for all first-year students. The responses from civil rights organizations, students, university employees and citizens have been emphatic and diverse. Even the North Carolina Conference of the NAACP and the state ACLU -- traditional allies -- disagree on what the study commission should recommend to Bowles. Earlier this week, the Rev. William Barber II, president of the state NAACP, lobbied the study commission to recommend the adoption of hate-crime policies and diversity education. He said that the characterization of the Free Expression Tunnel slogans as "graffiti" short-changed their power to intimidate and insisted that the words were nothing short of "terrorist symbols." Barber believes the university system in general and N.C. State in particular have a history of "white-washing" such incidents. He expressed dissatisfaction with the school's response to a 2007 incident in which a toilet paper noose was found in a bathroom. "If the institution had put a policy in last year when the first noose [surfaced] we wouldn't be here today," Barber said. The ACLU agrees with Barber that the slogans were hateful, but parts ways on the method of response. "The statements found on the walls are offensive, reprehensible and evidence a complete lack of respect for the history of racial violence against African Americans in North Carolina and around the country," wrote Katherine Lewis Parker, legal director of the ACLU, in a letter to Bowles. "Further, we do not doubt the authenticity of the fears expressed by African American-students in response to the statements. However, the First Amendment to the United States Constitution protects speech no matter how offensive its content, so long as it does not fall into very narrow exceptions. As a court long ago explained in the infamous Skokie case, 'it is better to allow those who preach racial hate to expend their venom in rhetoric rather than to be panicked into embarking on the dangerous course of permitting the government to decide what its citizens may say and hear.'" Parker believes that "hate speech codes" adopted by state universities amount to government censorship, and administrator support for such policies is an attempt at a quick fix. "As has already been evidenced by student response to the statements, when hate is out in the open, people can see the problem," she wrote. "They can then organize effectively to counter bad attitudes, possibly change them, and forge solidarity against the forces of intolerance." The majority of speakers participating in a forum held by the study commission earlier this month supported the adoption of hate crime policies. Opinions shared via phone and e-mail with members of the study commission demonstrate a much wider and more complicated array of feelings about the issue. "It certainly has opened up a broad conversation for special interest groups and individuals who want to ensure that, in the norm, we recognize the importance of free speech to the First Amendment, that it is protected and we should not do anything to compromise the free speech of students, faculty and employees," said Harold Martin, UNC General Administration's senior vice president for academic affairs and the chairman of the study commission. More than two dozen e-mails on the subject poured into General Administration before the public forum. Martin said they keep coming with every meeting of the study commission. One letter writer, Marcus Kindley of Greensboro, expressed the concerns of many when he wrote that "our society is setting up a judgmental system whereby only certain individuals make the decision as to what is 'Hate Speech' and what is not." "It is a slippery slope that you put society on when 'YOU' become the arbitrators of what is acceptable and decide what is not," Kindley wrote. "I DO NOT believe that you have more intelligence or knowledge than I do. Who are you to decide what is or isn't proper to be said?" Appalachian State University English professor Jill Ehnenn took an opposing stance. "Those who argue that hate crimes legislation is unnecessary because it caters to 'special interests' are grossly misguided," Ehnenn wrote. "Because those who make that argument do not belong to a targeted group, they cannot see their (white or straight) privilege. They see themselves as the norm, as universal, and thus cannot recognize their bias." In supporting the adoption of a policy, "there can only be pros to such steps, and no cons," she wrote. Martin stressed that the commission is charged with addressing hate crimes -- which would include actions, not simply speech. It's a legal fine line that members of the commission have examined in depth and sometimes have struggled to find clarity. The convergence of speech and action has also been confusing for the public, Martin acknowledged, but he said the broad range of issues introduced have bolstered the study commission's work. "It has not made it more difficult, frankly," Martin said. "It has made it a more thoughtful conversation." |
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| abb | Jan 29 2009, 06:12 AM Post #5 |
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http://heraldsun.southernheadlines.com/orange/10-1083036.cfm Legal experts to advise panel BY DANIEL GOLDBERG : The Herald-Sun dgoldberg@heraldsun.com Jan 29, 2009 CHAPEL HILL -- No fewer than three legal experts or consultants are participating in the 11-member hate crimes study commission. UNC law professor Judith Wegner and Josh Starin, a N.C. Central law student, are members of the commission. Laura Bernstein Luger, vice president and general counsel at UNC General Administration, is guiding the commission's work in an ex-officio role. Other attorneys have contributed to the effort or submitted opinions. After hearing and reading the arguments for and against a university-wide hate crime policy it becomes clear that legal principles -- not moral nor emotional outrage related to both sides of hate crime policy -- will guide the commission recommendations. The rift between the NAACP and the ACLU provides an illustration of the complex legal arguments that the study commission must consider. The NAACP supports implementation of a hate crime policy. The ACLU opposes it. And yet both arguments rely at least in part on the same court case. In the 2003 case, Virginia v. Black, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a state can regulate activities such as cross burnings when the action constitutes a "true threat." In other words, the act must "communicate a serious expression of an intent to commit an act of unlawful violence to a particular individual or group of individuals." The N.C. NAACP interprets this ruling to include the statements painted at N.C. State's Free Expression Tunnel. "The U.S. Supreme Court in 2003 and the N.C. Supreme Court in 1997 (In Re Spivey) ruled the First Amendment does not protect KKK-associated threats and the use of the 'N' word in a threatening manner," the organization claims in a document submitted to the study group. "Both decisions reflect a deep understanding of their constitutions' free speech protections, the auto-immune system in our body politic. Both courts, however, went out of their way to rule that Klan-associated terrorist symbols and 'N' word threats were not protected by the First Amendment and our N.C. Constitution's similar protections." An ACLU opinion submitted by Katherine Lewis Parker, the organization's legal director, disagrees. Parker argues that the Supreme Court ruling made the intent of the speaker communicating a threat a key consideration. She wrote that the intent behind the Free Expression Tunnel incident did not place those statements within the narrow regulatory waters of a true threat. "While we do not doubt that some students felt fearful of bodily harm in response to hearing about the statements, it does not appear from the facts as we understand them that the students who made the statements did so with the intent of placing other students in fear of bodily harm or death," Parker wrote. |
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| abb | Jan 29 2009, 06:22 AM Post #6 |
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http://www.newsobserver.com/news/story/1385936.html Published: Jan 29, 2009 12:30 AM Modified: Jan 29, 2009 06:09 AM Beating in Durham parking garage puts focus on security Lighting, cameras get consideration Stanley B. Chambers Jr., Staff Writer Comment on this story DURHAM - Better lighting and the installation of surveillance cameras would improve safety at city-owned parking garages in downtown Durham, residents said Wednesday at a meeting about public parking. About 20 people gathered in City Council chambers to discuss downtown parking issues with officials from Lanier Parking Solutions, which manages the city parking lots, and the city. The meetings are a requirement of the contract the company has with the city. The talk at the gathering, scheduled to happen every other month, mostly focused on security inside downtown parking decks. For some who live and work downtown, safety at city-owned parking decks wasn't a major issue until Durham businessman Martin Eakes, co-founder of the Self-Help Credit Union, was attacked by four men as he walked to his car in the Corcoran Street parking garage on Nov. 24. He suffered several bruises, a wound on his forehead that required 15 stitches and a severed muscle that required surgery. One person was arrested for possessing Eakes' stolen cell phone. No one has been charged with his beating. Police, who have increased patrols in the area, think the attack was random. Karen Giroux, who owns a building on West Main Street, said she has never felt unsafe in her two years of living downtown. She suggested installing surveillance cameras and working with Durham-based Cree Inc. to improve lighting. "All sorts of dreams are coming true with downtown Durham, as in the performing arts center and downtown restaurants," said Giroux. "I just want to keep downtown Durham safe." David Fairbaugh, Carolinas general manager for Lanier, said his company also has suggested cameras, along with lighting improvements and blue light alarms. He plans to submit a budget to city officials by March 1 showing how much the improvements would cost. "We are interested in exploring that, and that is a priority with us, too," said Chris Boyer, interim director of general services for the city. She said the main challenge is finding the money to pay for the improvements because of the reductions in city spending due to tough economic times. Two electricians have worked to fix broken lights, and all are working, Fairbaugh said. He said the lights' age has reduced their effectiveness. Security officers in brightly colored vests conduct foot patrols in the decks between 6 p.m. and 1 a.m. The main problem they face is removing homeless people who sleep in the stairwells, said Joe Vallejos, who oversees parking operations in Durham for Lanier. The security officers are in contact with police, who have easy access into the parking decks. stan.chambers@newsobserver.com or 919-932-2025 |
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| Bill Anderson | Jan 29 2009, 08:19 AM Post #7 |
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So, the UNC-Chapel Hill student body president is murdered and so mutilated that it took over a day to identify her body, but the REAL danger to everyone in the UNC system are spray-painted slogans and toilet-paper nooses. What about the "Death to Rapists" article in the NCCU student paper after Cooper's declaration of "innocent"? That not only was hate speech, but also a death threat, yet nothing was even said. So, let us understand what is happening. We see the utter PC Erskine Bowles bowing to the crowd that actually did endorse a real hate crime in order to cower before toilet paper and spray paint. Truly pathetic.
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| Quasimodo | Jan 29 2009, 10:09 AM Post #8 |
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I agree. I wouldn't have sanctioned threats of physical violence to Obama; but NCCU hasn't a leg to stand on if it tolerates--PRINTS!--an editorial calling for the same against persons who have been declared innocent. Where was the committee to study that? The appointed board of legal experts? The NC NAACP? (Oh, never mind...) |
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| DMom | Jan 29 2009, 10:44 AM Post #9 |
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VCU police chief arrested in undercover solicitation sting http://www.timesdispatch.com/rtd/news/local/article/VCUUGAT29_20090129-101608/192165/ By Staff Reports Published: January 29, 2009 Virginia Commonwealth University Police Chief William B. Fuller has been arrested in an online sting operation in Chesterfield County and charged with soliciting sex from a 14-year-old girl, police said today. Police said Fuller, 50, of the 9000 block of Meadowfield Court in Henrico, was arrested yesterday. They said Fuller believed he was communicating by computer with an underage teen rather than with a police detective. He was charged with using a communications device to solicit sex from a minor and attempted indecent liberties with a minor. He is being held without bond in the Chesterfield Jail pending a pre-trial hearing this afternoon in Chesterfield Juvenile and Domestic Relations District Court. VCU suspended Fuller without pay and appointed Carlton Edwards, a VCU police captain, as interim chief. "We've taken action," said VCU Rector Thomas Rosenthal. He said he received a call from university President Eugene Trani this morning about the arrest. |
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| abb | Jan 29 2009, 10:45 AM Post #10 |
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http://www.thetimes-tribune.com/articles/2009/01/29/news/sc_times_trib.20090129.a.pg1.tt29judges_s1.2266390_top2.txt Luzerne County Judges suspended by state Supreme Court WILKES-BARRE — Two Luzerne County judges facing 87 months in prison for allegedly taking $2.6 million in kickbacks were stripped of their judicial duties by the state Supreme Court on Wednesday. BY DAVE JANOSKI STAFF WRITER Published: Thursday, January 29, 2009 6:44 AM EST WILKES-BARRE — Two Luzerne County judges facing 87 months in prison for allegedly taking $2.6 million in kickbacks were stripped of their judicial duties by the state Supreme Court on Wednesday. Mark A. Ciavarella Jr. and Michael T. Conahan are expected to plead guilty to fraud and conspiracy charges in federal court Feb. 12 and subsequently resign from the bench and bar. Judge Ciavarella, who stepped down as president judge Monday but remains on the bench, was suspended with pay from all judicial and administrative duties pending the outcome of his case. Common pleas judges were paid annual salaries of $157,441 in 2008. Judge Conahan retired at the end of 2007 at age 55 but worked regularly as a senior judge presiding over the county’s drug treatment court. The Supreme Court revoked his certification as a senior judge, and he will no longer be paid by the state. Senior judges can work up to 13 days per month and are paid about $500 per day. Judge Conahan’s pension benefits will not be affected until he is sentenced, a state spokesman said earlier this week. In its order suspending Judge Ciavarella, the Supreme Court wrote that it acted “in view of the compelling and immediate need to protect and preserve the integrity of ... the administration of justice for the citizens of Luzerne County.” Judge Conahan, 56, and Judge Ciavarella, 58, could not be reached for comment. They remain free pending their plea hearing before U.S. District Court Judge Edwin M. Kosik in Scranton on Feb. 12. Judge Ciavarella’s attorney, Albert Flora Jr., said he was not surprised by the Supreme Court action, relayed in two one-page orders issued around 4 p.m. Wednesday. “It’s all part of the process,” Mr. Flora said. Judges Conahan and Ciavarella are accused of accepting payments from the co-owner of two juvenile detention centers in Pittston Twp. and Butler County and the contractor who built the facilities. Court documents filed by federal prosecutors say the two judges helped the company that owned the centers, Pennsylvania Child Care LLC, secure county contracts worth millions of dollars. Judge Ciavarella, who presided over juvenile court, instituted procedures that increased the potential that juveniles would be placed in detention centers, pressured court staffers to recommend detention and detained juveniles when juvenile probation officers recommended otherwise, prosecutors allege. The two judges tried to hide the origin of the payments made to companies and bank accounts under their control through the use of falsified records and failed to fully report their sources of income on annual financial disclosure forms filed with the state, according to prosecutors. Judges Conahan and Ciavarella have signed plea agreements that are expected to be approved at the Feb. 12 hearing. Contact the writer: djanoski@citizensvoice.com |
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| DMom | Jan 29 2009, 11:37 AM Post #11 |
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http://www.wral.com/news/local/story/4426276/ Case dismissed against woman accused in cult crimes Posted: Today at 10:19 a.m. Durham, N.C. — The case against a Durham woman accused of aiding in crimes authorities say were carried out by a satanic cult was dismissed Thursday after a judge denied a request to delay the case. Dianna Palmer, 44, of Cottage Woods Court, was charged in July with one count of accessory after the fact of assault with a deadly weapon. Police said Palmer knew about assaults alleged to have occurred in a residence on Albany Street in Durham and said she helped Joseph Scott Craig remove evidence from the house.Craig, 25, and his wife, Joy Johnson, 30, were arrested in June after a man and a woman told authorities they were beaten, shackled to beds, kept in dog cages and starved. Prosecutors have said a man and a woman met Craig through a shared interest in Satan worship but said they never consented to physical abuse. Palmer and Johnson knew each other through the Durham County Democratic Party. Palmer is the party's first vice-chair, and Johnson was the third vice-chair, as well as the vice-chair of the Young Democrats, before resigning the positions following her arrest. Prosecutors asked Thursday for a continuance in Palmer's case, but defense attorney Bill Thomas objected, saying the case had dragged on for more than six months. //snip// |
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| abb | Jan 29 2009, 01:21 PM Post #12 |
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http://www.johnincarolina.com/ Thursday, January 29, 2009 More re:Who should worry about Duke/Durham discovery? Anon @ 10:05 commented re: Who should worry about Duke/Durham discovery? Anon’s comments are in italics; my responses are in plain. Anon began - - - I look forward to discovery but I have never worried that it wouldn't happen. While they stressed the court will set limits on what can be asked during discovery, every attorney I’ve talked to – all with no direct involvement in the lawsuits, but all of whom are following the suits – has said Plaintiffs’ attorneys will be able to question in all the major areas in which the Plaintiffs’ are requesting discovery. I do hope those who should be worrying that discovery will happen are but I'm not sure they realize the gravity of their situation yet. I think some do have a sense of the gravity of their situation. Duke’s hiring Jamie Gorelick was, IMO, an admission on Duke’s part that its situation is so grave that the best legal counsel money can buy won’t be enough. So it hired a person known for her political influence rather than her knowledge of an extremely complex area of law. If attorneys in Duke’s Counsel’s office went along with a charade involving dissembling to students, parents and the court regarding the university’s alleged secret and illegal release of protected (FERPA) student personal information, then I’d think those attorneys know thyt face grave consequences from the court and the State Bar. Keep in mind that of all the terrible things Nifong did, it was the act of lying to the court that landed him in jail. I think by virtue of their professional training and experiences the police defendants have, or at least should have, a good understanding of the gravity of the claims made against them in the suits. It seems to me that some, particularly the miscreants at Duke, have gone merrily about business as usual, as if they didn't have a care in the world. Yes, but a lot of that is posturing. When you can’t/won’t tell your own insurer what happened, you know your situation is very serious even if you keep telling yourself somehow all your influence, loyal alums and billions will get you out of things with “just a few scrapes.” Clearly they want everyone to forget about it. They want to silence their critics and MoveOn but even if that happened it wouldn't matter. The lawsuits are what they should be worried about. Discovery should scare the peedoodle out of them. I get sufficient satisfaction knowing they are worried or they will be at some point. So many and so much will be exposed I should feel sorry for them but I don't. Of course they want to move on. They did terrible things. Thanks for your comment. Posted by JWM at 10:48 AM 0 comments |
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| abb | Jan 29 2009, 02:40 PM Post #13 |
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http://www.newsobserver.com/news/story/1386539.html Published: Jan 29, 2009 01:05 PM Modified: Jan 29, 2009 02:37 PM Charge dismissed in sexual assault case By Anne Blythe, Staff Writer Comment on this story DURHAM - A District Court judge dismissed a charge today against Diana Palmer, the former Durham County Democratic Party official accused this summer of being an accessory in a sexual assault case. But the case could be revived if the state Attorney General’s Office chooses to seek an indictment, a Durham prosecutor says. “This case should end here,” said Bill Thomas, the Durham lawyer who represented Palmer. An assistant district attorney had asked District Court Judge Nancy Gordon to continue the case this morning, But Thomas objected. Because the charge was a felony, state prosecutors could go to a grand jury and ask for an indictment. Palmer, a former first vice chairwoman of the Durham County Democratic Party, was jailed in July on on a charge of being an accessory after the fact of an assault with a deadly weapon. Investigators claimed she removed possible evidence from the home of Joy Suzanne Johnson, who had been the party's third vice chairwoman, and Johnson’s husband, Joseph Scott Craig. Police have accused Craig of beating and caging a man and sexually assaulting a woman in his and Johnson's Durham home. He is charged with second-degree rape, second-degree forcible sexual offense, three counts of second-degree kidnapping and two counts of assault with a deadly weapon.Johnson is accused of standing by during the assaults. Tracey Cline, Durham’s new district attorney, said earlier this month that she would ask the state Attorney General’s Office to take over the Johnson and Palmer cases to avoid the possibility of a conflict of interest. As a Democrat who ran for office this past spring, Cline was in contact with Johnson. There have been discussions among the Durham prosecutors and the state’s special prosecution team about a transfer of the cases, but no formal request had been received in the Attorney General’s Office as of this morning, according to Noelle Talley, spokeswoman for the office Defense lawyers have described the case as “consensual sadomasochism gone awry.” James Frederick Bethard, 19, of Maryland, accused Craig of forcing him into a dog cage with his arms and legs shackled, and beating him repeatedly with a cane. The woman who has accused Craig of raping her testified this summer that she also engaged in consensual oral sex with the accused more than once. The News & Observer is not identifying the woman in keeping with its general policy of not naming people who allege sex crimes. |
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| nyesq83 | Jan 29 2009, 02:55 PM Post #14 |
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Um, like threatening to burn a house down, or marching with a banner that says "CASTRATE"...or saying "DEAD MAN WALKING!" to someone in court? |
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| chatham | Jan 29 2009, 07:08 PM Post #15 |
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Hopefully this will make you smile a little. Eugene Volokh, January 29, 2009 at 2:45pm] Trackbacks Now That's a Pun for You: I ran across a new article called Not All It's Quacked Up To Be: Why State and Local Efforts to Ban Foie Gras Violate Constitutional Law. Foie gras, it turns out, is sometimes made from duck liver -- but the "Not All It's Quacked Up To Be" is not the pun I'm referring to. Rather, what I like is that the article is coming out in the Journal of Agricultural Law published at ... Drake University Law School. How that's for a thematic connection? |
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