Monday, October 30, 2006
Duke Lacrosse Injustice Grows Ever Worse
KC Johnson, who more or less owns the blogging story here, details the prosecutorial misconduct of DA Nifong here. Some a relatively minor, but three are not. My favorite is:
Rule 3.3a(1): A lawyer must not "make a false statement of material fact or law to a tribunal or fail to correct a false statement of material fact or law previously made to the tribunal by the lawyer."
Nifong started his involvement in the case--on March 23-4, when his office filed a motion demanding that the 46 white players on the team submit DNA and photo samples--by violating this rule. It is now clear that this motion was fraudulent in three ways:
Nifong claimed that the players called each other by first-name aliases and uniform numbers at the party; he had no evidence for either claim, and, indeed, no evidence for either claim exists now.
Nifong withheld from the court that the accuser had failed to identify any suspects in an official photo lineup, conducted in two parts on March 16 and March 21.
Nifong, it turned out, falsely promised the court that negative DNA tests would "immediately rule out any innocent persons."
The other 'dancer', Kim Roberts, now remembers that the accuser wanted "marks" on her skin after the two left the party.
DA Nifong, who had earlier revealed that neither he nor anyone in his office has yet interviewed the accuser about the facts of the case, says he regrets nary a thing.
Local ex-DA Norm Early, under whom I served my brief tenure as a prosecutor, says that it's OK not to interview the accuser but to rely solely on the police statements; the prosecutor's time is limited, after all.
Funny, Norm's view doesn't surprise me in the least.
Rule 3.3a(1): A lawyer must not "make a false statement of material fact or law to a tribunal or fail to correct a false statement of material fact or law previously made to the tribunal by the lawyer."
Nifong started his involvement in the case--on March 23-4, when his office filed a motion demanding that the 46 white players on the team submit DNA and photo samples--by violating this rule. It is now clear that this motion was fraudulent in three ways:
Nifong claimed that the players called each other by first-name aliases and uniform numbers at the party; he had no evidence for either claim, and, indeed, no evidence for either claim exists now.
Nifong withheld from the court that the accuser had failed to identify any suspects in an official photo lineup, conducted in two parts on March 16 and March 21.
Nifong, it turned out, falsely promised the court that negative DNA tests would "immediately rule out any innocent persons."
The other 'dancer', Kim Roberts, now remembers that the accuser wanted "marks" on her skin after the two left the party.
DA Nifong, who had earlier revealed that neither he nor anyone in his office has yet interviewed the accuser about the facts of the case, says he regrets nary a thing.
Local ex-DA Norm Early, under whom I served my brief tenure as a prosecutor, says that it's OK not to interview the accuser but to rely solely on the police statements; the prosecutor's time is limited, after all.
Funny, Norm's view doesn't surprise me in the least.
# posted by Roger Fraley @ 10:30 PM 
