| Adios, Ruth Sheehan; N&O Columnist to Leave for Law School | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Aug 4 2010, 07:19 AM (3,415 Views) | |
| Mason | Aug 4 2010, 11:14 AM Post #16 |
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Parts unknown
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. She is carrying on the banner for Crystal. At that time, we were told Crystal was going to pursue a career as a lawyer. I'm sure if you asked her - she'd tell you - I'm going to law school, Pro Bono! . |
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| MikeZPU | Aug 4 2010, 11:44 AM Post #17 |
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Hopefully Ruth will be willing to tell everything she knows, when she is deposed. She's leaving the N&O, so they won't be able to apply pressure to her (to keep silent.) If she's truly apologetic, then she'll come clean. If she would be willing to relate all the lies that she was told, and who was feeding her all those lies, that would be vitally important. IIRC, I thought I read somewhere that she already admitted that Nifong was a main source for her in those early days, but she didn't provide any details as far as I know. But what did Burness tell her, specifically what did he tell her "off the record" ? What about Gottlieb or Addison? Was she talking with them? Edited by MikeZPU, Aug 4 2010, 03:06 PM.
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| Rusty Dog | Aug 4 2010, 03:58 PM Post #18 |
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I have written a bye-ku for Ruth: She lit the firestorm. Now it's time for Ruth to go. We know she knows. Tell. |
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| Seen the Light | Aug 4 2010, 05:40 PM Post #19 |
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Exactly, this is far more dangerous than its getting discussion. I would rather her stay a journalist. Another activist with a law degree in the making. |
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| chatham | Aug 4 2010, 07:08 PM Post #20 |
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IMO, she wont be much more than something like a traffic lawyer. She is known to be swayed to easily and she does not investigate her claims. In other words she is lazy. She is not a journalist she is a opinion columnist.
Edited by chatham, Aug 4 2010, 07:09 PM.
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| maggief | Aug 4 2010, 08:39 PM Post #21 |
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Team's silence is sickening News & Observer, The (Raleigh, NC) - Monday, March 27, 2006 Author: Ruth Sheehan , Staff Writer Members of the Duke men's lacrosse team: You know. We know you know. Whatever happened in the bathroom at the stripper party gone terribly terribly bad, you know who was involved. Every one of you does. And one of you needs to come forward and tell the police. Do not be afraid of retribution on the team. Do not be persuaded that somehow this "happened" to one or more "good guys." If what the strippers say is true -- that one of them was raped, sodomized, beaten and strangled -- the guys responsible are not "good." This seems an elementary statement, I know. But I can see loyal team members sitting around convincing themselves that it would be disloyal to turn on their teammates -- why, the guys who were involved were just a little "over the top." In real life, they're funny. They call their mothers once a week. They share class notes with friends. They attend church. On this night, they were just a little too drunk, a little too "worked up." It was a scene straight out of "I am Charlotte Simmons" by Tom Wolfe. Indicative of the times. The alleged racial epithets slung at the strippers, who were black? Those were just ... jokes. Ditto for the ugly remarks overheard by a neighbor: "Thank your grandpa for my cotton shirt." Har, har. After all, these guys are not just Duke students, but student athletes. The collegiate dream. And the women? They were... strippers, for Pete's sake. I can see the team going down this path, justifying its silence. And it makes me sick. Because, of all the occupational hazards that must come with stripping, one of them should not be rape. And no, forced sex by a hunky prep student doesn't make it better. Unfortunately, because the team members are students at such a fine university, there is a tendency to presume that this was an aberration. That these players are "good guys." I see it in the references to the "Animal House" atmosphere allowed to flourish at the team captains' house. I sense it in the "dismay" expressed by athletics director Joe Alleva over the "situation" -- the hiring of the strippers and the (shocking!) serving of alcohol to underage teammates. But drunken parties are one thing. The implication that this event, if true, is somehow a bash that "got out of hand" is just plain wrong. Rape is not part of a spectrum of behavior, the regrettable end game when testosterone and beer are ignited by a shaking booty and fanned into flames by the larger team's permission. No. Rape is a crime. A very serious one. Those who commit it are criminals, not "good guys." I don't know what happened in that house, and in that bathroom, over in Durham. Ultimately, that will be a matter for the court system to decide. But who was in that room is something the police need to know. Now. They shouldn't have to wait for 46 DNA samples to be returned. Every member of the men's lacrosse team knows who was involved, whether it was gang rape or not. Until the team members come forward with that information, forfeiting games isn't enough. Shut down the team.
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| Quasimodo | Aug 4 2010, 08:48 PM Post #22 |
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Hi, Maggief!
Every member of Nifong's office staff, every ADA, knew that the case was a fraud. We shouldn't have to wait for depositions. Fire everyone in that office, now. Every member of the N&O staff who worked on the lax story knew there was more to it ("Dance gives details of ordeal"); and that there were sources which were never revealed to the public--most likely sources with agendas. We shouldn't have to wait for depositions to find out. Falsely convicting innocent persons of a crime that they didn't commit--in fact, one which never happened--is serious stuff. We know you know. |
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| Kerri P. | Aug 4 2010, 09:04 PM Post #23 |
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Hi Maggief
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| maggief | Aug 4 2010, 09:16 PM Post #24 |
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Hi Quasi! Lacrosse team out of control News & Observer, The (Raleigh, NC) - Monday, April 3, 2006 Author: Ruth Sheehan , Staff Writer That Duke University owned the house where the lacrosse team lived -- and a stripper claims she was beaten, raped and sodomized -- was "merely a quirk." It was chance. Bad luck. The university had just purchased the house on Buchanan Boulevard and 11 others, on Feb. 28, in an effort to help "stabilize the neighborhood." So just because a third of the lacrosse team players had been arrested in connection with "Animal House"-type behavior, don't get the impression that Duke was hosting some kind of wild quasi-fraternity. Duke wasn't hosting -- but it wasn't doing much to shut it down, either. In a conversation Friday afternoon with John Burness, Duke 's senior vice president for public affairs (aka the man in charge of Duke 's image), I learned that the university was fully aware of the antics of its lacrosse team before the sensational gang-rape investigation. Burness said that Durham police had been asked to inform the university when its students were arrested in town. The charges then were dealt with in the student court system. So yes, Duke officials were aware. They were aware of the neighbors' complaints in Trinity Park about loud parties and rowdy behavior. They were aware of those past charges against the players. (Although, to be fair, the charges against 15 players came in dribs and drabs over two years.) And they were aware of the lacrosse team's general reputation. It's no coincidence Tom Wolfe chose lacrosse players as the most vile characters in his depiction of life at "Dupont University." (Gothic campus, you got the picture.) Unfortunately, the university's awareness did not translate into action. In fact, at a press conference last week, and then in a TV interview on MSNBC, Duke President Richard Brodhead and Burness, respectively, made remarks that seemed to suggest that the earlier charges against the lacrosse players were your standard college student antics. Drunk and disorderly, public urination, we've all done it -- right? On Friday, Burness assured me that both he and Brodhead were only trying to distinguish between the hiring of strippers and serving of alcohol to minors -- which was "stupid and boorish" -- and "something as horrific as sexual assault and rape." Well, duh. My point was that, whatever comes of the rape allegations, the lacrosse team was widely known to be out of control long before those allegations were ever made. Instead of stabilizing neighborhoods, Duke might want to first stabilize its student-athletes; you know, the ones who are supposed to be role models? Upholding Duke 's standards, Burness said, was lacrosse coach Mike Pressler's responsibility. So dump him. Because the coach and athletic director Joe Alleva are the university's responsibility. After all, I asked Burness, do you think Coach K would allow this sort of behavior from his basketball players? Of course not. Owning the home where a lacrosse team party careens into hell may be a quirk. But having a team that behaves responsibly and honorably happens only by design. // If lying, take her to task News & Observer, The (Raleigh, NC) - Thursday, April 13, 2006 Author: Ruth Sheehan , Staff Writer The first e-mail message invoking Tawana Brawley arrived in my inbox at 11:36 on the Monday morning after the Duke lacrosse story first broke. In the two-and-a-half weeks that followed, the messages citing Brawley ebbed and flowed depending on the news of the day -- until Monday, when DNA showed that none of the lacrosse team members matched the samples taken from the woman who alleged rape during a team party. Suddenly Tawana Brawley became a poster child. For those of you who don't remember Brawley, she was the 15-year-old black girl from New York who was found in November 1987 covered in feces, with racial epithets written on her body in charcoal. She claimed she had been raped by six white police officers. Rallies and marches followed. The Rev. Al Sharpton got involved. But soon after, the girl's story unraveled. When the case was brought before a grand jury, the charges were deemed baseless. The police officers later sued. Although Brawley continued to maintain her tale, even years later, it is widely accepted to have been a hoax. I hope that is not, as so many readers have suggested, what we have in Durham today. It's not that I want the lacrosse players to be guilty of rape. I don't. I don't want anyone to have been raped. I don't want anyone to have been wrongly accused of a terrible crime. But I really don't want this woman to have made up these rape allegations. False accusations, in any case, are morally abominable. In this particular case, false accusations would have sullied the reputations of dozens of players, ruined a team's season and poisoned town-gown and race relations in Durham. There is no punishment on the books sufficient for a woman who would falsely accuse even the biggest jerks on campus of gang rape. If that is what happened, the accuser must be named and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. Because if a woman falsely accuses a man, or in this case, a group of men, of raping her, her treachery reaches beyond the confines of her own case and the wreckage it has caused there. It reaches beyond, into the lives of every woman who has ever truly been the victim of a rape. It reaches into the lives of every woman yet to be a victim. There is no one who abhors a false accusation more than a true victim of this crime. I know because I was raped 21 years ago, on my 20th birthday. Twenty years ago this week, in fact. I never turned the man in, never reported the rape, never even told family or friends until many years later. Not because I feared the police. Or the prosecutors. Or my rapist. I feared the disbelief. In the end, that is what Tawana Brawley sowed in the racial tinderbox of New York state in the 1980s: disbelief and distrust and, out of that, animosity. With her discredited tale, she undermined years of public education about rape as an expression of power and violence, not of sexual desire. With her discredited tale, she spit in the faces of all true rape victims who find the courage to come forward and challenge those who do not want to believe. // Duke case hard to unclutter News & Observer, The (Raleigh, NC) - Thursday, May 11, 2006 Author: Ruth Sheehan , Staff Writer We want it to be neat. We want it tied up in a tidy package that tells the world, yes, this is what happened, and this is what it means. But life is seldom that cooperative. Look no farther than the lacrosse /rape morass at Duke University. Wouldn't it be nice if what happened there were readily obvious, if we knew who did what when, and why? But we don't, so we take the facts as they trickle out and try to analyze them. We try to separate good guys from bad. We journalists are as guilty as anyone. That's because it's our job to report on what is going on and to try to make sense of it for our readers. So as the story has evolved, we have all, readers and writers alike, searched for the appropriate boxes to put it in. We've searched for good guys and, finding few, have trained our sights on a succession of bad guys, many of whom turn out to be not so bad after all. For a while it looked like District Attorney Mike Nifong might be the sacrificial lamb in the case. The grandstanding media hog who inexplicably complained about losing his anonymity -- while running for public office. Then he won a tough election, proving the adage: Any publicity is good publicity -- as long as they spell your name right. Then, briefly, the focus was on drinking on campus. In some ways it was a relief: an old problem we know and understand. That is so much easier to process than graduates of all-boys Catholic high schools hiring strippers, writing sadistic e-mail (as a joke?) and being accused of rape. It's so much easier to sympathize with the scrappy college student and single mother than the exotic dancer who filed rape charges against three other men 10 years ago. In the end, we want the lacrosse players to be saints -- or monsters. We want the woman to be honorable, even though she worked for an escort service -- or a hustler. We want her to have told a consistent story -- even though some victims of rape do and say things that do not help their cases. We want Duke officials to be part of a conspiracy to cover up bad actions by athletes -- or responsive leaders willing to make tough choices under extreme pressure. We want the Durham police to have learned something since the days that Mike Peterson skewered them repeatedly for mishandling cases. We want this rape never to have occurred. And yet we want this woman not to have lied. Already, as one female lawyer put it, the case has wiped out decades of progress, as this "alleged victim" is called upon to answer for her past and her profession. We want black and white in a universe of gray. And by this time, we have learned that the more information emerges, the murkier the case becomes. I dread the way all the murkiness will be manipulated and muddied further in the months ahead as this case drags out. Of course, the prosecutors and high-priced defense lawyers (not to mention the public relations specialist hired by the lacrosse players' families) will do their best to paint the bad guys and good guys in bold strokes. If only real life were so neat. It's not. // Race has a place in Duke case News & Observer, The (Raleigh, NC) - Thursday, May 18, 2006 Author: Ruth Sheehan , Staff Writer How do I put this delicately? Victoria Peterson is an unusual woman. She's a frequent, though uniformly unsuccessful, candidate for office in Durham -- someone who seeks the spotlight at public forums, especially if microphones or TV cameras are around. During the recent rally of the New Black Panthers, one of my colleagues observed, the chairman of the group struggled to keep Peterson from monopolizing his megaphone. She was running for City Council at the time. Peterson and I crossed paths back when she attended the murder trial of Mike Peterson (no relation), as one of his faithful supporters. She was running for City Council then, too. But Peterson is nothing if not passionate. And on Monday, when she showed up at a news conference with defense attorney Joseph B. Cheshire V, she used her moment in the spotlight to good effect. Cheshire, who has been the point man on the defense side of the Duke lacrosse case, was holding forth on the "false accusations" made by the "false accuser." Peterson inserted herself into the event by asking about the racial epithets said to have been used by some of the lacrosse players on the night that three team members are accused of raping one of the dancers, who is African-American. Cheshire responded by saying that in any group of 46 people, you could hear a racist or sexist statement of some sort. He said his client, team captain David Evans, and the other young men on the lacrosse team are victims. He also said, "This case is not about race." Cheshire may be right that his client and others have had their lives "chopped up" unfairly. They may in fact be innocent of every charge. But on the issue of race, he is wrong. This case is about a lot of things, and race is definitely one of them. For once, Victoria Peterson was dead-on. This case is about race because the slur-slinging -- alleged by both of the dancers -- is the one allegation that defense attorneys have not disputed. Contrary to Cheshire's implication -- it doesn't matter how drunk you get, or how many drunken friends you're with, you won't sling racial epithets if they're not in your internal dictionary. I have been in lots of groups of 46, or more, and heard nary an insult. The case is about race because of the nation's sorry history on race. Many African-Americans live with the memory of a time when white men raped black women with neither social sanction nor legal penalties. It's about race because some people cannot believe nice boys from upper-crust homes could commit a crime against what talking heads such as Rush Limbaugh and Tucker Carlson have dubbed the "ho" or "crypto-hooker." Believe me when I say that some of my mail has been far uglier, and more racially charged. The question I wish Victoria Peterson had asked is: Would this story have been so huge if it had involved 46 members of the football team at St. Augustine's or Shaw? Perhaps. But would so many people be rallying to the defense of those St. Aug's or Shaw players if the dancers from the escort service had been white? On that, I'm not so sure. // DA ought to hand off case News & Observer, The (Raleigh, NC) - Monday, June 19, 2006 Author: Ruth Sheehan , Staff Writer There are two ways for Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong to get out of the mess otherwise known as the Duke lacrosse case. One, he can surrender to criticism and call for a special prosecutor to step in and take command. Two, he can wait for a write-in candidate to make history and unseat a sitting Democratic district attorney in Durham County. Great choices, eh? Every time I think this case can't get any messier, it reaches new lows. We still don't know what happened in that house near the Duke campus. Perhaps Nifong has a stash of evidence that will make it clear the woman who danced for the lacrosse players was indeed held against her will and violated, as the indictments against the three men charge. But publicly at least, the prosecutor's case appears to be unraveling, and the work of the Durham Police is once again called into question. (I'm having a Mike Peterson flashback.) Most troubling is what the district attorney appears to have known, compared with what he said, in the early days of the investigation -- about the use of condoms by the alleged perpetrators, for example, or the identity of the 911 caller. And of course there was the DA's harrowing description of the crime itself -- which appears to contradict the emergency room report and the woman's own conflicting accounts. To think that for a brief moment I actually pitied Nifong for the attacks on his handling of the case. What a joke. Nifong is the one who described this thing in such incendiary terms from the start that it was impossible to ignore. Say all you want about the media's rush to judgment. But the truth is we report on allegations and charges out of district attorneys' offices every single day. And when a DA, especially one with Nifong's reputation for being a quiet, behind-the-scenes guy, comes out not only saying that a rape occurred, but that it was a brutal gang rape, in which the woman was strangled and beaten, you had to figure he had incontrovertible evidence. Apparently, he didn't. Whether he was shooting from the hip based on word-of-mouth inaccuracies or flat-out making the stuff up, I don't know. I do wonder whether his over-the-top remarks don't violate the bar's admonition against prosecutors "heightening public condemnation of the accused." This case has affected the reputations of three young athletes, possibly unfairly. It has torn off the scabs on race and class -- in Durham and beyond. You need look no further than the blogosphere for evidence of that. Sadly, it has also further eroded a wary public's confidence in our legal system. I tried contacting the prosecutor Friday to talk about all this, but his office was swamped with a new (false) rumor that he was planning a news conference to announce that he was asking that the case be dismissed. He never called me back. At this point, Nifong has damaged his own reputation and his own office to the point where he cannot possibly handle this case to its resolution. It's time for him to call in a special prosecutor and put himself -- and the rest of us -- out of our misery. // Too late to put a sock in it News & Observer, The (Raleigh, NC) - Thursday, July 20, 2006 Author: Ruth Sheehan , Staff Writer The Honorable Kenneth "Don't-let-the-press-bite-us" Titus had a little come-to-Jesus meeting with the defense lawyers and prosecutors in the Duke lacrosse case this week. The subject of the closed-door session -- publicity -- brings to mind one of my sons' favorite songs from the group The Black Eyed Peas. It goes: "Shut up Just shut up Shut up shut up shut up Shut it up, just shut up Shut up Just shut up Shut up shut up shut up ..." My sons delight in this song because "shut up" is a phrase we don't use in our home. For lawyers, shut up is something they don't do. Let's just say Judge Titus' warning is a weeeee bit late. In the weeks after a woman working as an exotic dancer first reported being raped by members of the Duke lacrosse team, District Attorney Mike Nifong gave dozens of interviews. We in the press ate it up. (Of course, now you can't get a word out of the guy with a can opener.) Since then, the defense attorneys have made up for lost air time, pitching their own versions of events and chastising Nifong with every other breath. I smiled when I saw that Joe Cheshire, chief spokesman for the defense, seemed a bit, well, defensive about the judge's admonition. No wonder. Cheshire has been like the cheeseball at the office Christmas party when it comes to Duke . Talk about the lacrosse case, and Cheshire always seems to turn up. I wrote a column about his remark, at a news conference this spring, that this case is not about race. When he shot me an e-mail message in reply, I posted it on my blog. Heck, I thought he would want me to. I later removed the note at Cheshire's request. He said I had violated his trust. This from a guy who plays the media like a Stradivarius. Don't get me wrong. I like Cheshire. If I were accused of murder, I'd call him first. But a guy with a silver tongue isn't paid to keep his mouth shut. Ironically, holding one's own counsel has its perils too. Just ask soon-to-be-former Durham Police Chief Steve Chalmers, who has weathered murders and gang warfare in the City of Medicine with a Calphalon finish only to draw raw criticism for his reticence on the Duke lacrosse case. Last week, Chalmers announced that he will be stepping down in 18 months. Finally, don't even get me going on Durham County Commissioner Lewis Cheek, who can't decide whether he is running against Nifong as an independent. His supporters -- some of whom used to be firmly in Nifong's camp -- raised the money, rounded up the requisite signatures and put the campaign on the map. But now that Cheek's name is on the ballot in November, he's not so sure he wants to be a candidate after all. Just like Titus' warning, it's a bit late for that. Apologies to songwriter Richard Berry, but: "Lewis, Lewie, oh, oh baby you gotta run now." And you thought Barry Saunders was the only one who could mess with song lyrics. I know, I know: "Ruth, just shut up." // Star of a blogging drama News & Observer, The (Raleigh, NC) - Thursday, August 17, 2006 Author: Ruth Sheehan , Staff Writer On Tuesday, an outstanding charge against taxi driver Moezeldin Elmostafa, one of the innocent bystanders in the Duke lacrosse mess, was changed from misdemeanor larceny to aiding and abetting misdemeanor larceny. This, based on the contents of a long-lost Hecht's department store videotape that allegedly shows Elmostafa helping one of his cab customers steal five purses worth $250. "This is garbage." Elmostafa is the guy who provided the kicker to a powerful alibi for Reade Seligmann, one of the young men accused in the alleged rape. So is it any big surprise that his background has been riffled by the "evil minions" of District Attorney Mike Nifong? Consider the difference in how Elmostafa and the accuser's compadre, Kim Roberts, have been treated. "Elmostafa is charged with what is a relatively trivial offense. Roberts was convicted of a felony and given probation, which she broke. Yet her bond was reduced." Quite the conspiracy, isn't it? But wait. Every item in italics here comes from that alternate universe known as the blogosphere. And these are some of the more sane and reasoned (read: not libelous) statements related to Elmostafa and the Duke case. There's more. Elmostafa told a reporter in May that he had just been waiting in the cab for the customer charged in the theft. He said that when he learned that the customer might have been involved in shoplifting, he assisted the store's security officers. But Elmostafa's version of events on the night of the lacrosse party doesn't jibe with Nifong's version. Which is probably why (some bloggers point out) the cabbie was picked up by detectives handling the lacrosse investigation. And it's probably why (others note) he was asked whether he had anything to add to his account of the night of the alleged rape. "When he refused, he was taken to the magistrate." What is this? "The Spanish Inquisition? ... It seems that's just how far Nifong is willing to go to try to convince the Duke alibi witness to change his tune." And then the Hecht's tape miraculously surfaces. "What we are seeing, my dear readers, is nothing but pure, unadulterated evil." If all of this seems a bit Grassy Knoll-ish, bear in mind that this is a case featuring a district attorney who apparently has scoured the petition putting his opponent on the November ballot (leading Nifong to threaten to quit a local animal protection board; a few of its members were among the 6,000 petition signers.) This is a case featuring one tangential character who has been interviewed as a she but may be a he. Need I go on? This case boasts plenty of bizarre fodder that is actually true. But I warn you, there's plenty more online that isn't. As a result, Elmostafa, the lowly cabbie, has become a pivotal player in the online drama. Bring in the feds! (Memo to Jason Bissey, the young man who claims to have overheard racist remarks from some of the lacrosse players: Keep your nose clean! This is an alternate universe you do not want to get sucked into.) // Trip to cabbie's trial a waste, with meter on News & Observer, The (Raleigh, NC) - Thursday, August 31, 2006 Author: Ruth Sheehan , Staff Writer Sitting in Durham District Courtroom No. 1 on Tuesday watching the " Elmo hour" stretch into a day, I was reminded of a colleague who was advised to watch the TV show "JAG" for insight into a military trial she was covering. Afterward, I asked her what she thought. She said: "I want my hour back." I feel the same way about my Tuesday. On Tuesday, Moezeldin Elmostafa, the cabbie who provides an alibi for one of the men indicted in the Duke lacrosse case, stood trial for allegedly aiding and abetting the shoplifting of five or six handbags from the Hecht's at Northgate Mall in Durham nearly three years ago. Elmostafa, known in the blogosphere as Elmo , was originally charged with misdemeanor larceny, but the district attorney's office dodged the statute of limitations and changed it. Before the trial, word was that the "aided and abetted" shoplifter in the case would testify against Elmo . Also, the authorities had a security tape proving Elmo 's involvement. Let's just say that neither one panned out. The shoplifter never testified. And the tape? Well, that was like going live with Geraldo Rivera when he opened Al Capone's vault: There was nothing there. Instead of showing a cab speeding away from the scene of a crime, the tape showed the shoplifter hiding her bags behind her hip, then getting in the backseat and closing the door. Then the cab pulled away from the curb. Elmo 's greatest crime? Failing to come to a complete stop in a near-empty mall parking lot. Elmo 's lawyer noted that it took nearly three years (and a role in the lacrosse mess) for the authorities to pursue his client -- even though Elmostafa continued to be employed by the same cab company until last year, and remains a part-owner of that cab company to this day. The assistant D.A. said Elmo couldn't be found because his first name had been misspelled. Uh, right. A few weeks ago, I used speculation about Elmo 's treatment (he's being harassed! his reputation tarnished!) to poke a little fun at the bloggers in the black-helicopter-infested skies of cyberspace. But darn if this isn't another case where the bloggers, with all their paranoid conspiracy theories, just might be right, however hysterical their tone. How else to explain the fact that District Attorney Mike Nifong was following this misdemeanor case so closely he asked to be informed when Elmo got picked up? The judge should have thrown the whole thing out. But in the end, at least she found Elmo not guilty. It was a waste of my day, to be sure. But it was also a wasted day for one judge, one clerk, two bailiffs, two assistant district attorneys and two Durham investigators working the lacrosse case. Unlike me, they were wasting time on the public's dime. Not to mention the cost of bringing the shoplifter from the women's prison near Rocky Mount to Durham. All for what? Even if Elmo were guilty -- and he might have been -- the district attorney's office should have taken a hard look at the evidence. From the vaunted videotape, to the testimony of their star witness -- a habitual shoplifter with a record a mile long. In fact, " Elmo hour" might hold a pointed lesson for Nifong et al: There are some charges that, for the sake of the accused, the victim, and the community, it just might be better to drop. |
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| sceptical | Aug 4 2010, 09:52 PM Post #25 |
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Maggief, many thanks for the text of the "Silence is Sickening" article by Ruth Sheehan. It is important to have these texts on the record, since some of them were lost when the old Liestoppers forum was destroyed and the N&O article index for the lacrosse case removed (many articles are still available by searching the N&O site under "duke lacrosse" or "Neff lacrosse" or "Sheehan lacrosse", but not "Silence is Sickening.") I hope someone with a big hard-drive has been archiving key documents and articles because they will not stay up forever on news organizations' websites. |
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| Quasimodo | Aug 4 2010, 10:33 PM Post #26 |
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Very interesting. I'd like to hear what else Burness was saying...and to whom in the press...("It was Pressler's responsibility"; the players had a bad past...etc.?) (and Coach K did indeed have players who hired strippers...) And yes, a team that behaves responsibly and honorably--as did the lax team under the most trying of circumstances (especially so for adults, but even more so for college-age youth)--happens only by design (ie, through coaches and parents). |
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| Quasimodo | Aug 4 2010, 10:34 PM Post #27 |
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Tell that to Cooper. And put it in an editorial in the paper on April 12, 2007. |
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| Quasimodo | Aug 4 2010, 10:42 PM Post #28 |
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Let me emphatically second that! Everybody ought to try and save something; it's very easy for things to disappear... (and if it is one day announced that the cases have been settled, you can expect that even more will disappear--overnight...) |
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| Baldo | Aug 4 2010, 11:49 PM Post #29 |
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You can always depend on maggief. Thanks! Sheehan should be deposed fully. Nifong & the DPD's hidden actions need to be fully revealed and I believed she admitted Nifong was a soucre. We need to know what was said and who else talked with her. She owes it to those guys not to be silent. Whether or not there was a conspiracy outside of Nifong & DPD I do not know, but it sure acts like one. I am also interested in who briefed Addison. Don't forget his DPD e-mail was sent after Ruth's column of March 27. Her article incited a community and indeed a national audience. Addison followed it up with his message on the heels of her work the next morning. on March 28. Read Ruth's column then read this and see the double whammy that was dealt to the 2006 Duke Lacrosse Team These actions piggybacked together. Unbelievable in the midst of this exculpatory evidence DPD’s Cpl Addison would post the following message to all Pac Servers and label it, "Hi Priority" with e-mail cc to 34 local media members. Over 2000 individuals would receive this directly from Cpl Addison in their in-boxes or user groups Addison Message Tue Mar 28, 2006 12:20 pm message # 1066 Durham CrimeStoppers needs your assistance…. On Monday, March 13, 2006 about 11:00pm, the Duke University Lacrosse Team solicited a local escort service for entertainment. The victim was paid to dance at the residence located at 610 Buchanan. The Duke Lacrosse Team was hosting a party at the residence. The victim was sodomized, raped, assaulted and robbed. This horrific crime sent shock waves throughout our community. Durham CrimeStoppers needs your assistance in solving this case. Although, we have received many calls expressing concerns and anger about this incident, we have not received any calls which will allow us to assist in resolving this case. We are extending our plea for information and help to our Duke family, who are also part of our community. We are asking anyone who has any information which will allow the Durham Police Department to make an arrest in this case, please contact Durham CrimeStoppers at 683-1200. Please feel free to email me at david.addison@... with any information. Please use an anonymous email account. Durham CrimeStoppers will pay cash for any information which leads to an arrest in this case. "There is no den in the wide world to hide a rogue.... Commit a crime and the world is made of glass" Ralph Waldo Emerson, Essays Corporal David Addison Durham CrimeStoppers Coordinator Durham Police Department 505 W. Chapel Hill Street http://liestoppers.blogspot.com/2009/05/pac-listservers-durham-pd-and-cpl.html Again DPD’s Cpl Addison would post the following message to all Pac Servers and label it, "Hi Priority" with e-mail cc to 34 local media members. Over 2000 individuals would receive this directly from Cpl Addison in their in-boxes or user groups Those guys never had a chance. |
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| jarms | Aug 9 2010, 09:32 AM Post #30 |
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Funny that Ruth bails from one dying profession to another that has had more than its share of bloodletting in the current recession. What does that say about her judgment? |
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9:15 AM Jul 11