Responses to the 2006 Duke University lacrosse case
Encyclopedia
The 2006 Duke University lacrosse case resulted in a great deal of coverage in the local and national media as well as a widespread community response at Duke
and in the Durham, North Carolina
area.
), trying to make ends meet by working as a stripper and escort—seemed tailor-made for wall-to-wall coverage. However, once the case deteriorated, critics saw it as a stinging showcase of bias in the media and the university system.
Among those giving extensive coverage to the matter was Nancy Grace
. Before Duke suspended its men's lacrosse team's season, she sarcastically noted on the air, "I'm so glad they didn't miss a lacrosse game over a little thing like gang rape!" and "Why would you go to a cop in an alleged gang rape case, say, and lie and give misleading information?" Another, Susan Estrich
, said "I teach criminal law. But what are we dealing with here? The mafia, or a sports team from a first-class university. Instead, they hire them lawyers to trash the victim and the prosecutor." Former prosecutor Wendy Murphy supplied the case with some of the most inflammatory claims and supported Nifong's withholding of evidence saying, "Nifong should be rewarded for respecting the defendants' rights by not leaking the type of evidence that could help him personally respond to criticism." Murphy said "I never, ever met a false rape claim, by the way. My own statistics speak to the truth."
Feminist blogger Amanda Marcotte
declared on her blog that people who defended the wrongly accused Duke students were "rape-loving scum". Time
reported that in "late January, more ethics charges were heaped on the District Attorney in the Duke University sexual-assault case, and Marcotte attacked the news with her usual swagger and sarcasm:" Marcotte later deleted posts on her blog critical of her statements, then later deleted the entire entry.
Reason
contributing editor Cathy Young
has described Marcotte as a "leader of the cyber-lynch mob in the Duke University rape hoax". In "Marcotte's eyes, the real crime of the 'independent feminists' is helping preserve the idea that the presumption of innocence
applies even in cases of rape and sexual assault."
Other outlets that have been accused of taking an initial pro-prosecution slants included, but are not limited to:
writer Lester Munson who opined, "I think the state has probably a better case than most observers are describing. I have studied this at some length ... There is some voracity to the victim's account."
On August 6, 2006, The News & Observer
of Raleigh, NC, wrote that District Attorney Mike Nifong "promised DNA evidence that has not materialized. He suggested that police conduct lineups in a way that conflicted with department policy." The article went on to say that "he made a series of factual assertions that contradicted his own files: He suggested the players used condoms; he accused the players of erecting a wall of silence to thwart investigators; and he said the woman had been hit, kicked and strangled. The medical and police records show that the victim had said no condom was used, that police had interviewed three players at length and taken their DNA samples and that the accuser showed no significant bruises or injuries."
On August 25, 2006, amid growing doubts as to the strength of the case and the veracity of Mangum, The New York Times
published a front page article by Duff Wilson and Jonathan Glater stating that the weaknesses in the case highlighted by the defense were not indicative of the strength of the case as a whole. "In several important areas, the full files, reviewed by The New York Times, contain evidence stronger than that highlighted by the defense." The Times story further indicated that "there is also a body of evidence to support decision to take the matter to a jury." This article would be widely criticized as the actual lack of strength of Nifong's case became apparent. In spite of widespread criticism, the newspaper's Public Editor defended Wilson, and he was permitted to remain on the case through Nifong's disbarment trial.
's Paula Zahn insisted that "the DA would not be proceeding with this case if he didn't believe that this alleged victim had been raped." She also demanded explanations "How, then, sir , do you explain the woman's injuries ... particularly some of the internal injuries?"
Perhaps the most grudging admission of exoneration came from The Boston Globe
, which stated in a lead editorial: "Three members of the Duke lacrosse team may have been louts, but all the evidence suggests they were not rapists . . . the students have the resources to get on with their lives."
Similarly grudging was sportswriter John Feinstein
, who stated on the syndicated sports talk show The Jim Rome Show in May 2007 "I think they're guilty of everything but rape" and "I really don’t want to hear that they’re victims and martyrs, and that their lives have been ruined." Feinstein, who in March 2006 had demanded the revocation of the scholarships of every Duke men's lacrosse team member, and who (against the findings of the Coleman report) continued to describe the team as "out-of-control", added "I don't think I've been proven wrong."
Nancy Grace
, who had been particularly vocal in her support for Nifong's prosecution, took the night off for the show following the Attorney General's dismissal of all charges, with Jane Velez-Mitchell
guest hosting instead.
While the march of the 2007 Duke men's team to the NCAA final game
generally received extensive and favorable coverage, a number of sportswriters published negative stories about the team. Washington Post columnist Mike Wise
wrote "[I]t's hard to embrace everyone as a victim. With all due respect to those 'INNOCENT' bracelets worn around Durham this year, this isn't "To Kill a Mockingbird
II." Chicago Tribune
columnist Philip Hersh commented, "The idea that the Duke lacrosse team's success is a feel-good story makes me ill. . . it would be a bigger mistake to believe (the dropping of charges) means Duke's lacrosse team was innocent of assault against common decency."
After proclamations by the North Carolina Attorney General, Roy Cooper
, that the three students were "innocent" in April, USA Today columnist and incoming Bennett College President, Dr. Julianne Malveaux, commented in an interview on National Public Radio a few days later that they were "hooligans," had lied, and that they "did not deserve an apology."
The Duke Chronicle
noted the closing of the case, and stated. "There are other members of the Duke community, however, from whom we have not heard [...] These are the voices of the range of individuals, from students to professors to community members, who responded to last year's allegations not with moderation [...] but with extreme, inflammatory and unfounded statements."
, Anne Allison
, Cathy Davidson
, Ariel Dorfman
, Michael Hardt
, Alice Kaplan
, Claudia Koonz
, Pedro Lasch
, Walter Mignolo
, Mark Anthony Neal
and Alex Rosenberg. The ad was spearheaded by faculty member Wahneema Lubiano.
In three departments, more than half of faculty signed the statement. The department with the highest proportion of signatories was African and African-American Studies, with 80%. Just over 72% of the Women's Studies
faculty signed the statement, Cultural Anthropology
60%, Romance studies
44.8%, Literature
41.7%, English
32.2%, Art
& Art History
30.7%, and History
25%. No faculty members from the Pratt School of Engineering or full-time law
professors signed the document. Departments that had no faculty members sign the document include Biological Anthropology
and Anatomy
, Biology
, Chemistry
, Computer Science
, Economics
, Genetics
, Germanic Languages
/Literature, Psychology
and Neuroscience
, Religion
, and Slavic
and Eurasia
n Studies.
In January 2007, many months after the initial print of the ad, a new letter was posted at the Concerned Duke Faculty website signed by 87 faculty members stating that the original ad was misinterpreted. The letter states that the intent of the original ad was to address issues of racism and sexism in the community and not to prejudge the case.
In January 2007, lacrosse team member Kyle Dowd filed a lawsuit against Duke University and visiting associate professor and signatory to the original ad, Kim Curtis, claiming that he and another teammate were given failing grades on their final paper as a form of retaliation after the scandal broke. The case has been settled with the terms undisclosed except that Dowd's grade was altered to a P.
Dowd's mother emailed another original signatory, Houston Baker, who continued after the charges had been dropped to accuse her son and the others of being "hooligans, rapists," and called her "the mother of a farm animal."
Another signatory, Thavolia Glymph, said she was disappointed because "since the DNA results were returned Monday, we moving backwards." The DNA results indicated that there was neither any sexual nor physical connection between the stripper and the players she accused.
Seventeen faculty members of the economics
department sent a letter showing support for the players on January 6, 2007, saying, "We regret that the Duke faculty is now seen as prejudiced against certain of its own students," and telling the players that they are more than welcome to enroll in their courses.
Another group of students, Duke Students for an Ethical Durham, sought to encourage students to vote in the upcoming election as Durham residents. It was specifically created in response to Nifong's mishandling of the case. Nifong ended up winning the election.
The Association for Truth and Fairness (ATAF) seeks to raise money to defray some of the indicted players' legal fees. ATAF, a non-profit organization, will continue to "help victims of abuses of power and other prosecutorial injustices."
Wristbands saying "Duke Lacrosse 2006 INNOCENT! #6 #13 #45" were also sold to raise money for the cause.
An outpouring of support came at the beginning of the 2007 lacrosse season. For the season opener, 6,485 fans attended the game to cheer the Blue Devils on their way to a 17-11 victory over Dartmouth.
, where the accuser was a student. The crowd, predominantly African American, criticized the media for portraying the accuser as a stripper and escort instead of a mother and student. One questioner said that Duke University hospital must have tampered with the DNA sample for it to come back negative, while another suggested that the accuser ought to have been helicoptered to Wake med
for treatment since Duke had a conflict of interest. One NCCU student, Chan Hall, as quoted by Newsweek, http://www.newsweek.com/id/47592/page/7 stated, "It's the same old story. Duke up, Central down." He continued that he wanted to see the Duke students prosecuted "whether it happened or not. It would be justice for things that happened in the past." NCCU Chancellor
James H. Ammons Jr.
said that "[t]his incident has forced us to examine issues relevant to any campus environment -- sexism, racism and the need to educate our students about sexual assault and violence against women." At the same time, he urged the crowd to be patient and let the legal process take its course.
After Nifong dropped the rape charges against the three players in December 2006, the NAACP's "case monitor" and NCCU
law professor Irving Joyner stated that the drop of rape charges could help Nifong's case: "Now, they don’t have to establish that there was penetration committed against the accuser . . . In addition to that, now they don’t have to deal with the DNA or the lack of DNA evidence. And with the rape shield statute, it’s unlikely that information will even come before the jury to consider."
On the official state NAACP's website, an 82 point 'Crimes and Torts committed by Duke Lacrosse Team Players' memo was listed long after the charges were dropped and the players were declared innocent. Included in the memorandum was an assessment of the defendants' strategy to have the charges dropped: "The three defendants they have two mountains to climb. First, they must deflect public attention from their boorish, racist, and illegal behavior by mounting outlandish attacks on the survivor and the D.A. Second, they must deal with a mountain of physical evidence, that is corroborated by, we have reason to believe, accounts of some of the men who were at the party who have cooperated with the police and the D.A. from early on." North Carolina Attorney General Roy A. Cooper
refuted these facts in the summary of findings report. It stated that "no evidence ... corroborate[d] the accusing witness's versions of the events ... No DNA evidence confirmed her stories ... No medical evidence confirmed her stories ... No other witness confirmed her stories ... The accusing witness’s accounts of the story changed significantly."
In April 2006, civil rights activist Al Sharpton
was invited on Fox's The O'Reilly Factor
to discuss the case. Sharpton began the interview by commending the "blacks and whites who stood vigil and to come together in that community to stand up for this girl." In response to Bill O'Reilly's questions concerning the possibility that the woman might have fabricated the allegations, Sharpton said, "First of all, the authorities have charged there was a crime. ... When the prosecutors went forward, they clearly have said this girl is the victim, so why would we be trying the victim?" When O'Reilly mentioned recent news reports that DNA testing had failed to match any of the defendants, Sharpton said, "I think that all of the facts that you have laid out the DA had — and I know this DA is probably not one that is crazy. He would not have proceeded if he did not feel that he could convict." Sharpton continued that the case parallels "Abner Louima
, who was raped and sodomized in a bathroom." At the conclusion of the interview, when O'Reilly said that Sharpton didn't know what happened, Sharpton agreed. "I don't know yet and I think that the proper thing to do is to support those that want justice."
On April 15, 2006, civil rights activist Jesse Jackson
said that his non-profit Rainbow/Push Coalition organization would pay for the college tuition of the accuser, Mangum, whether she fabricated the story or not. Jackson said that she should never "have to stoop that low to survive." He continued that the "...fantasy's as old as slave masters impregnating young slave girls [...] The character of this thing is chilling [and] [s]omething happened that everybody's ashamed of..." Defense attorney Joe Cheshire found Jackson's comment about "slave masters" odd because the players did not ask for black strippers. "There is no slave-master mentality here, and that's just another perfect example of [...] self-absorbed race pandering," Cheshire stated.
After all charges were dropped on April 13, 2007, the North Carolina NAACP praised the state attorney general's investigation into Magnum's claims that had found them to be without merit.
s. One blog which supported the three students was Durham-in-Wonderland authored by Brooklyn College
history professor K.C. Johnson. Johnson also co-authored a book on the case with journalist Stuart Taylor
, entitled Until Proven Innocent: Political Correctness and the Shameful Injustices of the Duke Lacrosse Rape Case. The players' lawyers stated that they used the blog as a resource throughout the case, and Seligmann made a point of thanking Johnson in his statement following the dismissal of charges.
" was distributed on campus and in nearby neighborhoods shortly after the allegations surfaced in March 2006 showing pictures and names of 40 members of the lacrosse team, urging them to "come forward" with information on the alleged rape.
Moneta and Brodhead placed Reade Seligmann and Collin Finnerty on interim suspension for the Spring 2006 semester following their indictment, while David Evans graduated the day before he was indicted. In the fall of 2006, their status was modified to "administrative leave" to allow them to make academic progress while not at the university.
Richard H. Brodhead
, president of Duke University, was quoted by WRAL-TV
as saying to the Durham Chamber of Commerce on April 20, 2006, "If our students did what is alleged, it is appalling to the worst degree. If they didn’t do it, whatever they did is bad enough." At the same time, Brodhead repeatedly stated that "our students must be presumed innocent until proven otherwise," with his earliest citation on March 25, 2006.
On December 20, 2006, Brodhead stated that "the DA's case will be on trial just as much as our students will be." Two days later, Nifong dropped the most serious rape charges against the players. Brodhead released a statement calling for Nifong to recuse himself and questioned his actions: "Given the certainty with which the district attorney made his many public statements regarding the rape allegation, his decision today to drop that charge must call into question the validity of the remaining charges. The district attorney should now put this case in the hands of an independent party who can restore confidence in the fairness of the process. Further, Mr. Nifong has an obligation to explain to all of us his conduct in this matter."
On January 3, 2007, Brodhead invited Seligmann and Finnerty back to Duke as students in good standing even though they still faced charges. They were also welcomed to participate on the lacrosse team. Brodhead explained, "We have decided that the right and fair thing to do is to welcome back Reade Seligmann and Collin Finnerty to resume their studies at Duke for the spring semester. Although the students still face serious charges and larger issues require Duke’s collective attention, the circumstances in this case have changed substantially, and it is appropriate that the students have an opportunity to continue their education." After the charges were dropped, Seligmann decided to enroll at Brown University
, while Finnerty chose to attend Loyola College in Maryland
.
Brodhead, in an interview with Lesley Stahl
of 60 Minutes
, stated that "Duke has a rule and many, many, many other universities observe the same rule, which is that when a student is indicted for a crime that has an element of violence, we often separate the student from the university because you don't know at that time what harm [...] might be done either in the community or to the student. It isn’t a judgment of guilt. It isn't a disciplinary measure. And what we've done is to use the interim to try to understand the nature of the case better. Weighing a lot of things [...] the presumption of innocence, the nature of the charges, the need of the students to get on with their life. Once the facts took the turn they did in December, then we had to rebalance those things. Then at that point it just seemed to us that simple fairness meant that we had to allow the students to come back."
In regards to the team's season, Duke athletic director Joe Alleva decided to forfeit two games due to admitted behaviors such as "underage drinking and hiring private party dancers". According to Brodhead, the team's players then "wished to suspend competitive play until the DNA results come back." Brodhead then decided to suspend the remainder of the season until "there [was] a clearer resolution of the legal situation."
In an open letter to the public, Brodhead outlined his formation of committees to examine the lacrosse team, the administration's response to the incident, the student judicial process, campus culture, and a presidential council. The committees have been criticized by some observers, including K.C. Johnson, former student president Elliott Wolf (offered a seat in the Campus Culture Initiative), and the Chronicle, since it was chaired by several Group of 88 members such as Anne Allison
, Karla FC Halloway, and lacrosse critics Prasad Kasibhatla and Peter Wood. Among the conclusions of the Group-chaired committees was shared governance of athletics by faculty members, and required classes for students by Group members. Also, the student senate representative was Chauncey Nartey, a student who Sue Pressler had previously reported to the police because he had made death threats to Mike Pressler's family.
After Nifong's resignation and disbarment, Brodhead released a statement: "One fact stares us in the face: The ordeal of the last 15 months was wholly unnecessary. It was not the result of reasonable differences of legal opinion or honest errors of judgment. Our students were accused by the community's senior law enforcement officer with no credible basis in fact [...] The actions Duke took caused consternation to many in the University family, which I profoundly regret. As Duke University's president, I resolve to do my part to repair the harm unleashed by Mr. Nifong's actions and to move forward from this painful episode."
Later, Brodhead apologized to the lacrosse players and their families for the university's "failure to reach out" in a "time of extraordinary peril." Brodhead's actions generated criticism from opinion pieces in the media. For example, Newsweek
published an article on September 10, 2007 that argued that "Brodhead and Nifong [the DA in the case] had an almost willful disregard for the facts." An article in The Economist
on September 15, 2007, stated that Brodhead did "little, if anything, to defend the lacrosse players or to criticise the faculty [at Duke] for its lynching mob mentality." Stuart Taylor Jr. and K. C. Johnson argue President Broadhead and other administrators "portray[ed] them [the students] with grotesque exaggeration as a bunch of uncooperative, rowdy, drunken white racists who might well be rapists, too. Nifong, hoping to divert attention from the powerful proof of innocence in the soon-to-be-public DNA tests (that exculpated the students), could hardly have hoped for a more obliging helper than Richard Brodhead."
in May 2006) wrote a scathing letter on March 29, 2006, regarding the lacrosse team and the administration's response to the incident, asking, "[w]hat have Duke and its leadership done to address this horrific, racist incident alleged to have occurred" and asserting "we have been deeply embarrassed by the silence that seems to surround this white, male athletic team's racist assaults (by words, certainly - deeds, possibly) in our community."
Baker also wrote that the players were "safe under the cover of silent whiteness" and these "[y]oung, white, violent, drunken men among us - [are] implicitly boasted [sic] by our athletic directors and administrators." He said Duke has joined other colleges and universities in the "blind-eying of male athletes, veritably given license to rape, maraud, deploy hate speech, and feel proud of themselves in the bargain." He also explicitly stated that the lacrosse players displayed "abhorrent sexual assault, verbal racial violence, and drunken white male privilege loosed amongst us."
Duke University Provost Peter Lange responded, "I cannot tell you how disappointed, saddened and appalled I was to receive this letter from you. A form of prejudice - one felt so often by minorities whether they be African American, Jewish or other - is the act of prejudgment: to presume that one knows something 'must' have been done by or done to someone because of his or her race, religion or other characteristic." He continued, "We do not know much about the worst of what may have happened in the incident that has inflamed our community," and concluded, "Sadly, letters like yours do little to advance our common cause."
Brodhead appointed Duke Law Professor, James E. Coleman, Jr., to head the committee to examine the lacrosse team's culture. Dr. Coleman found that the team has exhibited "exemplary academic and athletic performance" and is "[n]either racist or sexist. On the contrary, the coach of the Duke Women's Lacrosse team has expressed her sense of camaraderie that exists between the men's and women's team; members of the men's team, for example, consistently come to the women's games. The current as well as former black members of the team have been extremely positive about the support the team provided them." Also in the report, while it was stated that the rates of alcohol abuse for the lacrosse team were higher than most other Duke athletic teams, "their conduct has not been different in character than the conduct of the typical Duke student who abuses alcohol."
Since then, Coleman has been one of the most vocal critics of Nifong's handling of the case. In an interview with 60 Minutes, Coleman argued that he pandered to the black community in the middle of the election campaign: "I think that he pandered to the community by saying 'I'm gonna go out there and defend your interests in seeing that these hooligans who committed the crime are prosecuted. I'm not gonna let their fathers, with all of their money, buy, you know, big-time lawyers and get them off. I'm doing this for you.'" Furthermore, Coleman stated that Nifong has committed serious prosecutorial misconduct, and if there was a conviction, there "would be a basis to have the conviction overturned based on his conduct."
Professor Steven Baldwin of the Chemistry Department was another of the few faculty members to make public statements about the case. In two letters to the Duke Chronicle ("What About Mike Pressler?" in April 2006 and "The Administration's Mismanagement of Lacrosse" in October 2006), Dr. Baldwin strongly criticised the administration's handling of the case, especially with respect to Coach Mike Pressler.
Duke University
Duke University is a private research university located in Durham, North Carolina, United States. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present day town of Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1892. In 1924, tobacco industrialist James B...
and in the Durham, North Carolina
Durham, North Carolina
Durham is a city in the U.S. state of North Carolina. It is the county seat of Durham County and also extends into Wake County. It is the fifth-largest city in the state, and the 85th-largest in the United States by population, with 228,330 residents as of the 2010 United States census...
area.
Initial coverage (March-April 2006)
The case attracted widespread media attention almost from the moment it became public. The apparent circumstances—three white males (David Evans, Reade Seligmann, and Collin Finnerty) from privileged backgrounds at an elite university apparently taking advantage of a student and single mother (Crystal Gail Mangum) from a crosstown black college (NCCUNorth Carolina Central University
North Carolina Central University is a public historically black university in the University of North Carolina system, located in Durham, North Carolina, offering programs at the baccalaureate, master’s, professional and doctoral levels....
), trying to make ends meet by working as a stripper and escort—seemed tailor-made for wall-to-wall coverage. However, once the case deteriorated, critics saw it as a stinging showcase of bias in the media and the university system.
Among those giving extensive coverage to the matter was Nancy Grace
Nancy Grace
Nancy Ann Grace is an American legal commentator, television host, television journalist, and former prosecutor. She frequently discusses issues from what she describes as a victims' rights standpoint, with an outspoken style that has won her both praise and condemnation...
. Before Duke suspended its men's lacrosse team's season, she sarcastically noted on the air, "I'm so glad they didn't miss a lacrosse game over a little thing like gang rape!" and "Why would you go to a cop in an alleged gang rape case, say, and lie and give misleading information?" Another, Susan Estrich
Susan Estrich
Susan Estrich is an American lawyer, professor, author, political operative, feminist advocate, and political commentator for Fox News.-Early life:...
, said "I teach criminal law. But what are we dealing with here? The mafia, or a sports team from a first-class university. Instead, they hire them lawyers to trash the victim and the prosecutor." Former prosecutor Wendy Murphy supplied the case with some of the most inflammatory claims and supported Nifong's withholding of evidence saying, "Nifong should be rewarded for respecting the defendants' rights by not leaking the type of evidence that could help him personally respond to criticism." Murphy said "I never, ever met a false rape claim, by the way. My own statistics speak to the truth."
Feminist blogger Amanda Marcotte
Amanda Marcotte
Amanda Marie Marcotte is an American blogger best known for her writing on feminism and politics. Time magazine described her as "an outspoken voice of the left" and said "there is a welcome wonkishness to Marcotte, who, unlike some star bloggers, is not afraid to parse policy with her...
declared on her blog that people who defended the wrongly accused Duke students were "rape-loving scum". Time
Time (magazine)
Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...
reported that in "late January, more ethics charges were heaped on the District Attorney in the Duke University sexual-assault case, and Marcotte attacked the news with her usual swagger and sarcasm:" Marcotte later deleted posts on her blog critical of her statements, then later deleted the entire entry.
Reason
Reason (magazine)
Reason is a libertarian monthly magazine published by the Reason Foundation. The magazine has a circulation of around 60,000 and was named one of the 50 best magazines in 2003 and 2004 by the Chicago Tribune.- History :...
contributing editor Cathy Young
Cathy Young
Cathy Young is a Russian American journalist and writer whose books and articles, as well as columns which appear in the libertarian monthly Reason, and also weekly in The Boston Globe, primarily espouse equality feminism and libertarianism.-Life and Career:Born in Moscow, the capital of what was...
has described Marcotte as a "leader of the cyber-lynch mob in the Duke University rape hoax". In "Marcotte's eyes, the real crime of the 'independent feminists' is helping preserve the idea that the presumption of innocence
Presumption of innocence
The presumption of innocence, sometimes referred to by the Latin expression Ei incumbit probatio qui dicit, non qui negat, is the principle that one is considered innocent until proven guilty. Application of this principle is a legal right of the accused in a criminal trial, recognised in many...
applies even in cases of rape and sexual assault."
Other outlets that have been accused of taking an initial pro-prosecution slants included, but are not limited to:
- USA TodayUSA TodayUSA Today is a national American daily newspaper published by the Gannett Company. It was founded by Al Neuharth. The newspaper vies with The Wall Street Journal for the position of having the widest circulation of any newspaper in the United States, something it previously held since 2003...
- The Herald-Sun
- Rolling StoneRolling StoneRolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...
- New York Times
- News and Observer
- Independent WeeklyIndependent WeeklyThe Independent Weekly is a tabloid-format alternative weekly newspaper published in Durham, North Carolina, United States and distributed throughout the Research Triangle area and counties .The Independent is a member of the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies and has a...
wrote articles affirming the stereotypes of affluence with respect to the three accused. The only position cited was the description of the players' characters by faculty member Peter WoodPeter H. WoodPeter H. Wood is an American historian and author of Black Majority: Negroes in Colonial South Carolina from 1670 through the Stono Rebellion . It has been described as one of the most influential books on the history of the American South of the past 50 years. He is a professor at Duke...
.
The case continues (May-October 2006)
Grace continued to feature developments in the case on her program, with a pro-prosecution slant. On June 9, 2006, after hearing reporting on various defense motions, which the CNN reporter indicated might already prove reasonable doubt, Grace sarcastically asked, "Well I'm glad you have already decided the outcome of the case, based on all of the defense filings. Why don't we just all move to Nazi Germany, where we don't have a justice system and a jury of one's peers?" On June 22, 2006, she featured Sports IllustratedSports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated is an American sports media company owned by media conglomerate Time Warner. Its self titled magazine has over 3.5 million subscribers and is read by 23 million adults each week, including over 18 million men. It was the first magazine with circulation over one million to win the...
writer Lester Munson who opined, "I think the state has probably a better case than most observers are describing. I have studied this at some length ... There is some voracity to the victim's account."
On August 6, 2006, The News & Observer
The News & Observer
The News & Observer is the regional daily newspaper of the Research Triangle area of the U.S. State of North Carolina. The N&O, as it is popularly called, is based in Raleigh and also covers Durham, Cary, and Chapel Hill. The paper also has substantial readership in most of the state east of...
of Raleigh, NC, wrote that District Attorney Mike Nifong "promised DNA evidence that has not materialized. He suggested that police conduct lineups in a way that conflicted with department policy." The article went on to say that "he made a series of factual assertions that contradicted his own files: He suggested the players used condoms; he accused the players of erecting a wall of silence to thwart investigators; and he said the woman had been hit, kicked and strangled. The medical and police records show that the victim had said no condom was used, that police had interviewed three players at length and taken their DNA samples and that the accuser showed no significant bruises or injuries."
On August 25, 2006, amid growing doubts as to the strength of the case and the veracity of Mangum, The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
published a front page article by Duff Wilson and Jonathan Glater stating that the weaknesses in the case highlighted by the defense were not indicative of the strength of the case as a whole. "In several important areas, the full files, reviewed by The New York Times, contain evidence stronger than that highlighted by the defense." The Times story further indicated that "there is also a body of evidence to support decision to take the matter to a jury." This article would be widely criticized as the actual lack of strength of Nifong's case became apparent. In spite of widespread criticism, the newspaper's Public Editor defended Wilson, and he was permitted to remain on the case through Nifong's disbarment trial.
The case deteriorates (November 2006-May 2007)
After many inflammatory comments about the defendants, Nancy Grace's show covered the dismissal of charges on the day of the announcement, but with a substitute host. Undaunted by the lack of DNA evidence, CNNCNN
Cable News Network is a U.S. cable news channel founded in 1980 by Ted Turner. Upon its launch, CNN was the first channel to provide 24-hour television news coverage, and the first all-news television channel in the United States...
's Paula Zahn insisted that "the DA would not be proceeding with this case if he didn't believe that this alleged victim had been raped." She also demanded explanations "How, then, sir , do you explain the woman's injuries ... particularly some of the internal injuries?"
Perhaps the most grudging admission of exoneration came from The Boston Globe
The Boston Globe
The Boston Globe is an American daily newspaper based in Boston, Massachusetts. The Boston Globe has been owned by The New York Times Company since 1993...
, which stated in a lead editorial: "Three members of the Duke lacrosse team may have been louts, but all the evidence suggests they were not rapists . . . the students have the resources to get on with their lives."
Similarly grudging was sportswriter John Feinstein
John Feinstein
John Feinstein is an American sportswriter, author and sports commentator who wrote the top two best-selling non-fiction sports books in history, A Good Walk Spoiled and A Season on the Brink.-Early life:...
, who stated on the syndicated sports talk show The Jim Rome Show in May 2007 "I think they're guilty of everything but rape" and "I really don’t want to hear that they’re victims and martyrs, and that their lives have been ruined." Feinstein, who in March 2006 had demanded the revocation of the scholarships of every Duke men's lacrosse team member, and who (against the findings of the Coleman report) continued to describe the team as "out-of-control", added "I don't think I've been proven wrong."
Nancy Grace
Nancy Grace
Nancy Ann Grace is an American legal commentator, television host, television journalist, and former prosecutor. She frequently discusses issues from what she describes as a victims' rights standpoint, with an outspoken style that has won her both praise and condemnation...
, who had been particularly vocal in her support for Nifong's prosecution, took the night off for the show following the Attorney General's dismissal of all charges, with Jane Velez-Mitchell
Jane Velez-Mitchell
Jane Velez-Mitchell is an award winning television journalist and bestselling author. She currently has her own show on HLN, Issues with Jane Velez-Mitchell . She is often seen commenting on high-profile cases for CNN, TruTV, E! and other national cable TV shows...
guest hosting instead.
While the march of the 2007 Duke men's team to the NCAA final game
2007 NCAA Division I Men's Lacrosse Championship
The 2007 NCAA Division I Men's Lacrosse Tournament was held from May 12 through May 28, 2007. This was the 37th annual Division I NCAA Men's Lacrosse Championship tournament...
generally received extensive and favorable coverage, a number of sportswriters published negative stories about the team. Washington Post columnist Mike Wise
Mike Wise (American columnist)
Mike Wise is a sports columnist and feature writer for The Washington Post. He also hosts a midday radio show on WJFK-FM in Washington, D.C.-Career:...
wrote "[I]t's hard to embrace everyone as a victim. With all due respect to those 'INNOCENT' bracelets worn around Durham this year, this isn't "To Kill a Mockingbird
To Kill a Mockingbird
To Kill a Mockingbird is a novel by Harper Lee published in 1960. It was instantly successful, winning the Pulitzer Prize, and has become a classic of modern American literature...
II." Chicago Tribune
Chicago Tribune
The Chicago Tribune is a major daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, and the flagship publication of the Tribune Company. Formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" , it remains the most read daily newspaper of the Chicago metropolitan area and the Great Lakes region and is...
columnist Philip Hersh commented, "The idea that the Duke lacrosse team's success is a feel-good story makes me ill. . . it would be a bigger mistake to believe (the dropping of charges) means Duke's lacrosse team was innocent of assault against common decency."
After proclamations by the North Carolina Attorney General, Roy Cooper
Roy A. Cooper
Roy Asberry Cooper, III is the current North Carolina Attorney General. He is a member of the North Carolina Democratic Party.-Personal life and education:...
, that the three students were "innocent" in April, USA Today columnist and incoming Bennett College President, Dr. Julianne Malveaux, commented in an interview on National Public Radio a few days later that they were "hooligans," had lied, and that they "did not deserve an apology."
The Duke Chronicle
The Chronicle (Duke University)
The Chronicle is a daily student newspaper at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. The Chronicle was first published as The Trinity Chronicle on December 19, 1905. The paper's name was changed to The Chronicle when Trinity College was renamed Duke University following a donation by James...
noted the closing of the case, and stated. "There are other members of the Duke community, however, from whom we have not heard [...] These are the voices of the range of individuals, from students to professors to community members, who responded to last year's allegations not with moderation [...] but with extreme, inflammatory and unfounded statements."
Duke faculty groups
Soon after the allegations were made, 88 Duke professors (referred to sometimes as the "Group of 88", sometimes referred to as the "Gang of 88") from the Trinity College of Arts & Sciences placed an ad in The Chronicle referring to the circumstances surrounding the allegations as a "social disaster" and quoting primarily anonymous individuals citing racism and sexism in the Duke community. The advertisement concluded, "We're turning up the volume [...] To the students speaking individually and to the protestors making collective noise, thank you for not waiting and for making yourselves heard," and "These are the students shouting and whispering about what happened to this young woman." Notable signatories included Houston Baker, Miriam CookeMiriam Cooke
Miriam Cooke is an American born, British trained academic in Middle Eastern/Arab world studies. She focuses on modern Arabic literature, and connecting women's narratives of war stories to a critical reassessment of their role in the public sphere....
, Anne Allison
Anne Allison
Anne Allison is a professor of cultural anthropology at Duke University in the United States, specializing in contemporary Japanese society. She wrote the book Nightwork on hostess clubs and Japanese corporate culture after having worked at a hostess club in Tokyo.She received her BA from the...
, Cathy Davidson
Cathy Davidson
Cathy N. Davidson is an American scholar and university professor. She has served as the Ruth F. DeVarney Professor of English at Duke University since 1996 and has held a second distinguished chair as the John Hope Franklin Humanities Institute Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies since 2006...
, Ariel Dorfman
Ariel Dorfman
Vladimiro Ariel Dorfman is an Argentine-Chilean novelist, playwright, essayist, academic, and human rights activist. A citizen of the United States since 2004, he has been a professor of literature and Latin American Studies at Duke University, in Durham, North Carolina since 1985.-Personal...
, Michael Hardt
Michael Hardt
Michael Hardt is an American literary theorist and political philosopher perhaps best known for Empire, written with Antonio Negri and published in 2000...
, Alice Kaplan
Alice Kaplan
Alice Kaplan is the John M. Musser Professor of French at Yale University. Before her arrival at Yale, she was the Gilbert, Louis and Edward Lehrman Professor of Romance Studies and Professor of Literature and History at Duke University and founding director of the Center for French and Francophone...
, Claudia Koonz
Claudia Koonz
Claudia Ann Koonz is an American feminist historian of Nazi Germany. Her principal area of interest is the experience of women during the Nazi era.-Career overview:...
, Pedro Lasch
Pedro Lasch
Pedro Lasch is a visual artist born in Mexico City, and based in the U.S. since 1994. He produces works of conceptual art, institutional critique, social practice, and site-specific art, as well as paintings, photographs, prints, and works in traditional media. He has been regularly involved with...
, Walter Mignolo
Walter Mignolo
Walter D. Mignolo is an Argentine semiotician and professor at Duke University, who has published extensively on semiotics and literary theory, made up over a dozen new words, and worked on different aspects of the modern and colonial world, exploring concepts such as global coloniality, the...
, Mark Anthony Neal
Mark Anthony Neal
Mark Anthony Neal is Professor of Black Popular Culture in the Department of African and African-American Studies at Duke University, where he won the 2010 Robert B. Cox Award for Teaching...
and Alex Rosenberg. The ad was spearheaded by faculty member Wahneema Lubiano.
In three departments, more than half of faculty signed the statement. The department with the highest proportion of signatories was African and African-American Studies, with 80%. Just over 72% of the Women's Studies
Women's studies
Women's studies, also known as feminist studies, is an interdisciplinary academic field which explores politics, society and history from an intersectional, multicultural women's perspective...
faculty signed the statement, Cultural Anthropology
Cultural anthropology
Cultural anthropology is a branch of anthropology focused on the study of cultural variation among humans, collecting data about the impact of global economic and political processes on local cultural realities. Anthropologists use a variety of methods, including participant observation,...
60%, Romance studies
Romance studies
Romance studies is an umbrella academic discipline that covers the study of the languages, literatures, and cultures of areas that speak a Romance language. Romance studies departments usually include the study of Spanish, French, Italian, and Portuguese...
44.8%, Literature
Literature
Literature is the art of written works, and is not bound to published sources...
41.7%, English
English studies
English studies is an academic discipline that includes the study of literatures written in the English language , English linguistics English studies is an academic discipline that includes the study of literatures written in the English language (including literatures from the U.K., U.S.,...
32.2%, Art
Art
Art is the product or process of deliberately arranging items in a way that influences and affects one or more of the senses, emotions, and intellect....
& Art History
Art history
Art history has historically been understood as the academic study of objects of art in their historical development and stylistic contexts, i.e. genre, design, format, and style...
30.7%, and History
History
History is the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. History can also mean the period of time after writing was invented. Scholars who write about history are called historians...
25%. No faculty members from the Pratt School of Engineering or full-time law
Duke University School of Law
The Duke University School of Law is the law school and a constituent academic unit of Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, United States. One of Duke's 10 schools and colleges, the School of Law began as the Trinity College School of Law in 1868. In 1924, following the renaming of Trinity...
professors signed the document. Departments that had no faculty members sign the document include Biological Anthropology
Biological anthropology
Biological anthropology is that branch of anthropology that studies the physical development of the human species. It plays an important part in paleoanthropology and in forensic anthropology...
and Anatomy
Anatomy
Anatomy is a branch of biology and medicine that is the consideration of the structure of living things. It is a general term that includes human anatomy, animal anatomy , and plant anatomy...
, Biology
Biology
Biology is a natural science concerned with the study of life and living organisms, including their structure, function, growth, origin, evolution, distribution, and taxonomy. Biology is a vast subject containing many subdivisions, topics, and disciplines...
, Chemistry
Chemistry
Chemistry is the science of matter, especially its chemical reactions, but also its composition, structure and properties. Chemistry is concerned with atoms and their interactions with other atoms, and particularly with the properties of chemical bonds....
, Computer Science
Computer science
Computer science or computing science is the study of the theoretical foundations of information and computation and of practical techniques for their implementation and application in computer systems...
, Economics
Economics
Economics is the social science that analyzes the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. The term economics comes from the Ancient Greek from + , hence "rules of the house"...
, Genetics
Genetics
Genetics , a discipline of biology, is the science of genes, heredity, and variation in living organisms....
, Germanic Languages
Germanic languages
The Germanic languages constitute a sub-branch of the Indo-European language family. The common ancestor of all of the languages in this branch is called Proto-Germanic , which was spoken in approximately the mid-1st millennium BC in Iron Age northern Europe...
/Literature, Psychology
Psychology
Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior. Its immediate goal is to understand individuals and groups by both establishing general principles and researching specific cases. For many, the ultimate goal of psychology is to benefit society...
and Neuroscience
Neuroscience
Neuroscience is the scientific study of the nervous system. Traditionally, neuroscience has been seen as a branch of biology. However, it is currently an interdisciplinary science that collaborates with other fields such as chemistry, computer science, engineering, linguistics, mathematics,...
, Religion
Religion
Religion is a collection of cultural systems, belief systems, and worldviews that establishes symbols that relate humanity to spirituality and, sometimes, to moral values. Many religions have narratives, symbols, traditions and sacred histories that are intended to give meaning to life or to...
, and Slavic
Slavic languages
The Slavic languages , a group of closely related languages of the Slavic peoples and a subgroup of Indo-European languages, have speakers in most of Eastern Europe, in much of the Balkans, in parts of Central Europe, and in the northern part of Asia.-Branches:Scholars traditionally divide Slavic...
and Eurasia
Eurasia
Eurasia is a continent or supercontinent comprising the traditional continents of Europe and Asia ; covering about 52,990,000 km2 or about 10.6% of the Earth's surface located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres...
n Studies.
In January 2007, many months after the initial print of the ad, a new letter was posted at the Concerned Duke Faculty website signed by 87 faculty members stating that the original ad was misinterpreted. The letter states that the intent of the original ad was to address issues of racism and sexism in the community and not to prejudge the case.
In January 2007, lacrosse team member Kyle Dowd filed a lawsuit against Duke University and visiting associate professor and signatory to the original ad, Kim Curtis, claiming that he and another teammate were given failing grades on their final paper as a form of retaliation after the scandal broke. The case has been settled with the terms undisclosed except that Dowd's grade was altered to a P.
Dowd's mother emailed another original signatory, Houston Baker, who continued after the charges had been dropped to accuse her son and the others of being "hooligans, rapists," and called her "the mother of a farm animal."
Another signatory, Thavolia Glymph, said she was disappointed because "since the DNA results were returned Monday, we moving backwards." The DNA results indicated that there was neither any sexual nor physical connection between the stripper and the players she accused.
Seventeen faculty members of the economics
Economics
Economics is the social science that analyzes the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. The term economics comes from the Ancient Greek from + , hence "rules of the house"...
department sent a letter showing support for the players on January 6, 2007, saying, "We regret that the Duke faculty is now seen as prejudiced against certain of its own students," and telling the players that they are more than welcome to enroll in their courses.
Student groups and independent organizations
Many students showed their support for the lacrosse team during the investigation in a variety of ways. The Duke women's lacrosse team chose to wear "Innocent" sweatbands with the accused players' numbers during their games in the 2006 NCAA Final Four. "We want to win a national championship for ourselves but definitely also for the university and the men's team," one team member explained. "They don't really have a chance to play their season, which is a shame." The women came under fire from many in the media. Kevin Sweeney of Salon argued that their actions will make it more difficult for rape victims to speak out in the future, while New York Times sports columnist Harvey Araton stated that their "cross-team friendship" made them lose common sense.Another group of students, Duke Students for an Ethical Durham, sought to encourage students to vote in the upcoming election as Durham residents. It was specifically created in response to Nifong's mishandling of the case. Nifong ended up winning the election.
The Association for Truth and Fairness (ATAF) seeks to raise money to defray some of the indicted players' legal fees. ATAF, a non-profit organization, will continue to "help victims of abuses of power and other prosecutorial injustices."
Wristbands saying "Duke Lacrosse 2006 INNOCENT! #6 #13 #45" were also sold to raise money for the cause.
An outpouring of support came at the beginning of the 2007 lacrosse season. For the season opener, 6,485 fans attended the game to cheer the Blue Devils on their way to a 17-11 victory over Dartmouth.
North Carolina Central University forum
The day after DNA results came back negative, Nifong and other city officials such as Durham Mayor Bill Bell spoke at a community forum on April 12, 2006, on violence against women at N.C. CentralNorth Carolina Central University
North Carolina Central University is a public historically black university in the University of North Carolina system, located in Durham, North Carolina, offering programs at the baccalaureate, master’s, professional and doctoral levels....
, where the accuser was a student. The crowd, predominantly African American, criticized the media for portraying the accuser as a stripper and escort instead of a mother and student. One questioner said that Duke University hospital must have tampered with the DNA sample for it to come back negative, while another suggested that the accuser ought to have been helicoptered to Wake med
Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center
Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center is a teaching hospital located in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. It is the largest employer in Forsyth County with over 11,000 employees at its main location, and a total of 100 buildings on , including a 196-acre research farm and a research center downtown.The...
for treatment since Duke had a conflict of interest. One NCCU student, Chan Hall, as quoted by Newsweek, http://www.newsweek.com/id/47592/page/7 stated, "It's the same old story. Duke up, Central down." He continued that he wanted to see the Duke students prosecuted "whether it happened or not. It would be justice for things that happened in the past." NCCU Chancellor
Chancellor
Chancellor is the title of various official positions in the governments of many nations. The original chancellors were the Cancellarii of Roman courts of justice—ushers who sat at the cancelli or lattice work screens of a basilica or law court, which separated the judge and counsel from the...
James H. Ammons Jr.
James H. Ammons
Dr. James H. Ammons, is currently the president of Florida A&M University . He is a native Floridian who grew up in the heart of Florida's citrus belt. He graduated from Winter Haven High School in 1970 and entered Florida A&M University on the Thirteen College Curriculum Program during the fall...
said that "[t]his incident has forced us to examine issues relevant to any campus environment -- sexism, racism and the need to educate our students about sexual assault and violence against women." At the same time, he urged the crowd to be patient and let the legal process take its course.
NAACP and civil rights activists
The NAACP urged for a thorough investigation of the facts and a trial with a jury before the public formed an opinion on the case. North Carolina NAACP Legal Redress Chair, Al McSurely, explained that "The NAACP stands for fair play for all parties, zealous investigation and deep concern for the survivors of racist/sexist attacks." At the same time, some have criticized the NAACP for making statements that portrayed the players as racist despite evidence to the contrary, using the case to promote the group's cause, and implying guilt. McSurely stated that "[w]ithin five minutes, the men threatened the women with racial and misogynist verbal assaults," despite evidence to the contrary. He continued that the lacrosse players "were caught with their macho entitlement views hanging out and, to save themselves, they have banned together to blame the survivor of their verbal assaults."After Nifong dropped the rape charges against the three players in December 2006, the NAACP's "case monitor" and NCCU
North Carolina Central University
North Carolina Central University is a public historically black university in the University of North Carolina system, located in Durham, North Carolina, offering programs at the baccalaureate, master’s, professional and doctoral levels....
law professor Irving Joyner stated that the drop of rape charges could help Nifong's case: "Now, they don’t have to establish that there was penetration committed against the accuser . . . In addition to that, now they don’t have to deal with the DNA or the lack of DNA evidence. And with the rape shield statute, it’s unlikely that information will even come before the jury to consider."
On the official state NAACP's website, an 82 point 'Crimes and Torts committed by Duke Lacrosse Team Players' memo was listed long after the charges were dropped and the players were declared innocent. Included in the memorandum was an assessment of the defendants' strategy to have the charges dropped: "The three defendants they have two mountains to climb. First, they must deflect public attention from their boorish, racist, and illegal behavior by mounting outlandish attacks on the survivor and the D.A. Second, they must deal with a mountain of physical evidence, that is corroborated by, we have reason to believe, accounts of some of the men who were at the party who have cooperated with the police and the D.A. from early on." North Carolina Attorney General Roy A. Cooper
Roy A. Cooper
Roy Asberry Cooper, III is the current North Carolina Attorney General. He is a member of the North Carolina Democratic Party.-Personal life and education:...
refuted these facts in the summary of findings report. It stated that "no evidence ... corroborate[d] the accusing witness's versions of the events ... No DNA evidence confirmed her stories ... No medical evidence confirmed her stories ... No other witness confirmed her stories ... The accusing witness’s accounts of the story changed significantly."
In April 2006, civil rights activist Al Sharpton
Al Sharpton
Alfred Charles "Al" Sharpton, Jr. is an American Baptist minister, civil rights activist, and television/radio talk show host. In 2004, he was a candidate for the Democratic nomination for the U.S. presidential election...
was invited on Fox's The O'Reilly Factor
The O'Reilly Factor
The O'Reilly Factor, originally titled The O'Reilly Report from 1996 to 1998 and often called The Factor, is an American talk show on the Fox News Channel hosted by commentator Bill O'Reilly, who often discusses current controversial political issues with guests.The program was the most watched...
to discuss the case. Sharpton began the interview by commending the "blacks and whites who stood vigil and to come together in that community to stand up for this girl." In response to Bill O'Reilly's questions concerning the possibility that the woman might have fabricated the allegations, Sharpton said, "First of all, the authorities have charged there was a crime. ... When the prosecutors went forward, they clearly have said this girl is the victim, so why would we be trying the victim?" When O'Reilly mentioned recent news reports that DNA testing had failed to match any of the defendants, Sharpton said, "I think that all of the facts that you have laid out the DA had — and I know this DA is probably not one that is crazy. He would not have proceeded if he did not feel that he could convict." Sharpton continued that the case parallels "Abner Louima
Abner Louima
Abner Louima is a Haitian who was assaulted, brutalized and forcibly sodomized with the handle of a bathroom plunger by New York City police officers after being arrested outside a Brooklyn nightclub in 1997....
, who was raped and sodomized in a bathroom." At the conclusion of the interview, when O'Reilly said that Sharpton didn't know what happened, Sharpton agreed. "I don't know yet and I think that the proper thing to do is to support those that want justice."
On April 15, 2006, civil rights activist Jesse Jackson
Jesse Jackson
Jesse Louis Jackson, Sr. is an African-American civil rights activist and Baptist minister. He was a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1984 and 1988 and served as shadow senator for the District of Columbia from 1991 to 1997. He was the founder of both entities that merged to...
said that his non-profit Rainbow/Push Coalition organization would pay for the college tuition of the accuser, Mangum, whether she fabricated the story or not. Jackson said that she should never "have to stoop that low to survive." He continued that the "...fantasy's as old as slave masters impregnating young slave girls [...] The character of this thing is chilling [and] [s]omething happened that everybody's ashamed of..." Defense attorney Joe Cheshire found Jackson's comment about "slave masters" odd because the players did not ask for black strippers. "There is no slave-master mentality here, and that's just another perfect example of [...] self-absorbed race pandering," Cheshire stated.
After all charges were dropped on April 13, 2007, the North Carolina NAACP praised the state attorney general's investigation into Magnum's claims that had found them to be without merit.
Bloggers
The case received extensive coverage on blogBlog
A blog is a type of website or part of a website supposed to be updated with new content from time to time. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in...
s. One blog which supported the three students was Durham-in-Wonderland authored by Brooklyn College
Brooklyn College
Brooklyn College is a senior college of the City University of New York, located in Brooklyn, New York, United States.Established in 1930 by the New York City Board of Higher Education, the College had its beginnings as the Downtown Brooklyn branches of Hunter College and the City College of New...
history professor K.C. Johnson. Johnson also co-authored a book on the case with journalist Stuart Taylor
Stuart Taylor Jr.
Stuart Taylor Jr. is a regular columnist for National Journal, a Contributing Editor at Newsweek and a Nonresident Senior Fellow in Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution...
, entitled Until Proven Innocent: Political Correctness and the Shameful Injustices of the Duke Lacrosse Rape Case. The players' lawyers stated that they used the blog as a resource throughout the case, and Seligmann made a point of thanking Johnson in his statement following the dismissal of charges.
"Wanted poster" distribution
A poster that "looked like a wanted posterWanted poster
A wanted poster is a poster distributed to let the public know of an alleged criminal whom authorities wish to apprehend. They will generally include either a picture of the alleged criminal when a photograph is available, or of a facial composite image produced by a police artist...
" was distributed on campus and in nearby neighborhoods shortly after the allegations surfaced in March 2006 showing pictures and names of 40 members of the lacrosse team, urging them to "come forward" with information on the alleged rape.
Duke administration and University president
During the initial investigation of the players by Durham police, Dean Sue Wasiolek advised the players to cooperate with police and tell the truth, not tell anybody about the charges, nor hire attorneys because she thought nothing would come of it. Wasiolek is one of the defendants named in the Ekstrand lawsuit. Chris Kennedy, senior associate athletic director, told the captains to contact their parents immediately and to hire attorneys shortly after (on March 17).Moneta and Brodhead placed Reade Seligmann and Collin Finnerty on interim suspension for the Spring 2006 semester following their indictment, while David Evans graduated the day before he was indicted. In the fall of 2006, their status was modified to "administrative leave" to allow them to make academic progress while not at the university.
Richard H. Brodhead
Richard H. Brodhead
Richard Halleck Brodhead Marquis Who's Who on the Web currently serves as the ninth president of Duke University and is a scholar of 19th-century American literature.-Early life and education:...
, president of Duke University, was quoted by WRAL-TV
WRAL-TV
WRAL-TV, virtual channel 5 , is a television station in Raleigh, North Carolina. WRAL-TV has been the flagship station of Capitol Broadcasting Company since its inception, and is currently the CBS affiliate for the Raleigh/Durham/Chapel Hill/Fayetteville area, known collectively as the Triangle...
as saying to the Durham Chamber of Commerce on April 20, 2006, "If our students did what is alleged, it is appalling to the worst degree. If they didn’t do it, whatever they did is bad enough." At the same time, Brodhead repeatedly stated that "our students must be presumed innocent until proven otherwise," with his earliest citation on March 25, 2006.
On December 20, 2006, Brodhead stated that "the DA's case will be on trial just as much as our students will be." Two days later, Nifong dropped the most serious rape charges against the players. Brodhead released a statement calling for Nifong to recuse himself and questioned his actions: "Given the certainty with which the district attorney made his many public statements regarding the rape allegation, his decision today to drop that charge must call into question the validity of the remaining charges. The district attorney should now put this case in the hands of an independent party who can restore confidence in the fairness of the process. Further, Mr. Nifong has an obligation to explain to all of us his conduct in this matter."
On January 3, 2007, Brodhead invited Seligmann and Finnerty back to Duke as students in good standing even though they still faced charges. They were also welcomed to participate on the lacrosse team. Brodhead explained, "We have decided that the right and fair thing to do is to welcome back Reade Seligmann and Collin Finnerty to resume their studies at Duke for the spring semester. Although the students still face serious charges and larger issues require Duke’s collective attention, the circumstances in this case have changed substantially, and it is appropriate that the students have an opportunity to continue their education." After the charges were dropped, Seligmann decided to enroll at Brown University
Brown University
Brown University is a private, Ivy League university located in Providence, Rhode Island, United States. Founded in 1764 prior to American independence from the British Empire as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations early in the reign of King George III ,...
, while Finnerty chose to attend Loyola College in Maryland
Loyola College in Maryland
Loyola University Maryland is a Roman Catholic, Jesuit private university in Baltimore, Maryland, United States. Established as Loyola College in Maryland by John Early and eight other members of the Society of Jesus in 1852, it is one of 28 member institutions of the Association of Jesuit Colleges...
.
Brodhead, in an interview with Lesley Stahl
Lesley Stahl
Lesley Rene Stahl is an American television journalist. Since 1991, she has reported for CBS on 60 Minutes.-Personal life:...
of 60 Minutes
60 Minutes
60 Minutes is an American television news magazine, which has run on CBS since 1968. The program was created by producer Don Hewitt who set it apart by using a unique style of reporter-centered investigation....
, stated that "Duke has a rule and many, many, many other universities observe the same rule, which is that when a student is indicted for a crime that has an element of violence, we often separate the student from the university because you don't know at that time what harm [...] might be done either in the community or to the student. It isn’t a judgment of guilt. It isn't a disciplinary measure. And what we've done is to use the interim to try to understand the nature of the case better. Weighing a lot of things [...] the presumption of innocence, the nature of the charges, the need of the students to get on with their life. Once the facts took the turn they did in December, then we had to rebalance those things. Then at that point it just seemed to us that simple fairness meant that we had to allow the students to come back."
In regards to the team's season, Duke athletic director Joe Alleva decided to forfeit two games due to admitted behaviors such as "underage drinking and hiring private party dancers". According to Brodhead, the team's players then "wished to suspend competitive play until the DNA results come back." Brodhead then decided to suspend the remainder of the season until "there [was] a clearer resolution of the legal situation."
In an open letter to the public, Brodhead outlined his formation of committees to examine the lacrosse team, the administration's response to the incident, the student judicial process, campus culture, and a presidential council. The committees have been criticized by some observers, including K.C. Johnson, former student president Elliott Wolf (offered a seat in the Campus Culture Initiative), and the Chronicle, since it was chaired by several Group of 88 members such as Anne Allison
Anne Allison
Anne Allison is a professor of cultural anthropology at Duke University in the United States, specializing in contemporary Japanese society. She wrote the book Nightwork on hostess clubs and Japanese corporate culture after having worked at a hostess club in Tokyo.She received her BA from the...
, Karla FC Halloway, and lacrosse critics Prasad Kasibhatla and Peter Wood. Among the conclusions of the Group-chaired committees was shared governance of athletics by faculty members, and required classes for students by Group members. Also, the student senate representative was Chauncey Nartey, a student who Sue Pressler had previously reported to the police because he had made death threats to Mike Pressler's family.
After Nifong's resignation and disbarment, Brodhead released a statement: "One fact stares us in the face: The ordeal of the last 15 months was wholly unnecessary. It was not the result of reasonable differences of legal opinion or honest errors of judgment. Our students were accused by the community's senior law enforcement officer with no credible basis in fact [...] The actions Duke took caused consternation to many in the University family, which I profoundly regret. As Duke University's president, I resolve to do my part to repair the harm unleashed by Mr. Nifong's actions and to move forward from this painful episode."
Later, Brodhead apologized to the lacrosse players and their families for the university's "failure to reach out" in a "time of extraordinary peril." Brodhead's actions generated criticism from opinion pieces in the media. For example, Newsweek
Newsweek
Newsweek is an American weekly news magazine published in New York City. It is distributed throughout the United States and internationally. It is the second-largest news weekly magazine in the U.S., having trailed Time in circulation and advertising revenue for most of its existence...
published an article on September 10, 2007 that argued that "Brodhead and Nifong [the DA in the case] had an almost willful disregard for the facts." An article in The Economist
The Economist
The Economist is an English-language weekly news and international affairs publication owned by The Economist Newspaper Ltd. and edited in offices in the City of Westminster, London, England. Continuous publication began under founder James Wilson in September 1843...
on September 15, 2007, stated that Brodhead did "little, if anything, to defend the lacrosse players or to criticise the faculty [at Duke] for its lynching mob mentality." Stuart Taylor Jr. and K. C. Johnson argue President Broadhead and other administrators "portray[ed] them [the students] with grotesque exaggeration as a bunch of uncooperative, rowdy, drunken white racists who might well be rapists, too. Nifong, hoping to divert attention from the powerful proof of innocence in the soon-to-be-public DNA tests (that exculpated the students), could hardly have hoped for a more obliging helper than Richard Brodhead."
Other Duke faculty
Duke English Professor Houston Baker (now former professor as he was hired as a Distinguished University Professor at Vanderbilt UniversityVanderbilt University
Vanderbilt University is a private research university located in Nashville, Tennessee, United States. Founded in 1873, the university is named for shipping and rail magnate "Commodore" Cornelius Vanderbilt, who provided Vanderbilt its initial $1 million endowment despite having never been to the...
in May 2006) wrote a scathing letter on March 29, 2006, regarding the lacrosse team and the administration's response to the incident, asking, "[w]hat have Duke and its leadership done to address this horrific, racist incident alleged to have occurred" and asserting "we have been deeply embarrassed by the silence that seems to surround this white, male athletic team's racist assaults (by words, certainly - deeds, possibly) in our community."
Baker also wrote that the players were "safe under the cover of silent whiteness" and these "[y]oung, white, violent, drunken men among us - [are] implicitly boasted [sic] by our athletic directors and administrators." He said Duke has joined other colleges and universities in the "blind-eying of male athletes, veritably given license to rape, maraud, deploy hate speech, and feel proud of themselves in the bargain." He also explicitly stated that the lacrosse players displayed "abhorrent sexual assault, verbal racial violence, and drunken white male privilege loosed amongst us."
Duke University Provost Peter Lange responded, "I cannot tell you how disappointed, saddened and appalled I was to receive this letter from you. A form of prejudice - one felt so often by minorities whether they be African American, Jewish or other - is the act of prejudgment: to presume that one knows something 'must' have been done by or done to someone because of his or her race, religion or other characteristic." He continued, "We do not know much about the worst of what may have happened in the incident that has inflamed our community," and concluded, "Sadly, letters like yours do little to advance our common cause."
Brodhead appointed Duke Law Professor, James E. Coleman, Jr., to head the committee to examine the lacrosse team's culture. Dr. Coleman found that the team has exhibited "exemplary academic and athletic performance" and is "[n]either racist or sexist. On the contrary, the coach of the Duke Women's Lacrosse team has expressed her sense of camaraderie that exists between the men's and women's team; members of the men's team, for example, consistently come to the women's games. The current as well as former black members of the team have been extremely positive about the support the team provided them." Also in the report, while it was stated that the rates of alcohol abuse for the lacrosse team were higher than most other Duke athletic teams, "their conduct has not been different in character than the conduct of the typical Duke student who abuses alcohol."
Since then, Coleman has been one of the most vocal critics of Nifong's handling of the case. In an interview with 60 Minutes, Coleman argued that he pandered to the black community in the middle of the election campaign: "I think that he pandered to the community by saying 'I'm gonna go out there and defend your interests in seeing that these hooligans who committed the crime are prosecuted. I'm not gonna let their fathers, with all of their money, buy, you know, big-time lawyers and get them off. I'm doing this for you.'" Furthermore, Coleman stated that Nifong has committed serious prosecutorial misconduct, and if there was a conviction, there "would be a basis to have the conviction overturned based on his conduct."
Professor Steven Baldwin of the Chemistry Department was another of the few faculty members to make public statements about the case. In two letters to the Duke Chronicle ("What About Mike Pressler?" in April 2006 and "The Administration's Mismanagement of Lacrosse" in October 2006), Dr. Baldwin strongly criticised the administration's handling of the case, especially with respect to Coach Mike Pressler.
External links
- Coverage and commentary by KC Johnson, a Professor of History at Brooklyn College
- American Journalism Review's look at the media coverage
- Stuart Taylor's critique of New York Times coverage
- CBS 60 Minutes' segment "Duke Rape Suspects Speak Out"
- Duke Rape Scandal Photo Gallery
- Indictments (North Carolina v. Finnerty, Seligmann) FindLaw
- Dorm Room Search Warrants FindLaw
- NPR: Duke Lacrosse Players Arrested on Rape Charges
- State Bar Complaint against Mike Nifong
- Collected stories from The (Raleigh, N.C.) News & Observer
- Actual McFadyen email from The Smoking Gun
- Viewing the case in a larger jurisprudential context
- http://www.lewrockwell.com/anderson/anderson-arch.htmlAnalysis of evidence, media coverage, and prosecutorial misconduct, by William L. AndersonWilliam L. AndersonWilliam L. Anderson is an author and an associate professor of economics at Frostburg State University in Maryland. He is also an adjunct scholar with the Mackinac Center for Public Policy as well as for the Ludwig von Mises Institute in Alabama....
of LewRockwell.comLewRockwell.comLewRockwell.com is a 501 libertarian web magazine operated by Burton Blumert , Lew Rockwell , Eric Garris , and others associated with the Center for Libertarian Studies ; its motto is "anti-state, anti-war, pro-market"...
.] - CNN: Larry King Live Transcripts Duke University Rape Scandal; Interview With Dave Holloway
- Newsweek article after the incident
- Economist article