Duke Lacrosse - More Ethics Charges Against Nifong

The North Carolina State Bar is just rolling up the score against Mike Nifong.  KC Johnson is the place to go, but here is the AP:

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) -- The state bar has added ethics charges to a complaint filed against the prosecutor who brought sexual assault charges against three Duke lacrosse players, accusing him of withholding DNA evidence and misleading the court.

The new charges by the North Carolina State Bar against Durham County District Attorney Mike Nifong were announced Wednesday and could lead to his removal from the state bar, according to a copy of the updated complaint.

Nifong's office arranged for a private lab to conduct DNA testing as part of the investigation into allegations three men raped a 28-year-old woman hired to perform as a stripper at a party thrown by the lacrosse team last March.

Those tests uncovered genetic material from several men on the woman's underwear and body, but none from any lacrosse player. The bar complaint alleges those results weren't released to defense lawyers in a timely fashion and that Nifong repeatedly said in court he had turned over all evidence that would potentially benefit the defense.

Nifong's actions constitute a ''systematic abuse of prosecutorial discretion ... prejudicial to the administration of justice,'' the complaint read.

Comments

[Dan S]

I really don't understand the problem with the following:

"166. Nofong stated to a representative of the news media "[w]hat happened here was one of the worst things that's happened since I have become district attourney."

Seems to me that's arguably accurate.

[abe shorey]

Sylvia, please get off the collie and come explain the case to us again.

[BigFire]

Can we stop calling this case the Duke Lacross Rape Case(tm)? This should be Mike Nifong Railroading 3 Young Men to get Re-elected case.

[Dan S]

Hmm, there's more than ethics charges in this, I think (IANAL):

(wish I could cut & paste from this thing, miserable prehistoric technophobes!)

227. Nifong's failure to provide a complete report from DSI containing the results of all DSI's tests and examinations, including potentially exculpatory DNA test results, was a violation of N.C. Gen. Stat. 15A-282, 15A-903(a)(1), and 15A-903(a)(2).

229 Nifong's failure to provide the Duke Defendants with memorializations of Dr. Meehan's oral statements was a violation of N.C. Gen/ Stat/ 15A-903(a)(1).

As I said, IANAL, but that sure reads like violations of state law, not just ethical guidelines.

Still reading... It's damning, that's for certain.

[Dan S]

Wow, 230 to 250 is documentation of lie after misrepresentation after flat lie both in writing and before the Judge.

Yeah, I'd say we have here a conspiracy to violate the civil rights of the "defendants." Federal case any time the Feds want to pick it up.

[ed]

Hmmm.

@ Dan S

About #166. The issue is that North Carolina has rules that govern what a prosecutor can say about an ongoing case. Basically the prosecutor is not supposed to say anything that is prejudicial to the public about a case before it goes to trial.

And calling this "[w]hat happened here was one of the worst things that's happened since I have become district attourney." is pretty prejudicial.

[Dan S]

254 & 255 show Nifong dumping 1844 pages of documents on the defense after yet another discovery request (October 27). It sould be suggestive of trying to hide the exculpatory evidence in a mountain of words except for one thing:

He STILL didn't include the DSI report that showed ALL the results of the DNA testing. No, it was more likely meant to hide the fact that there was still information missing.

Considering this was written by his "brothers" of the bar, I'm a bit surprised he hasn't been tarred, feathered, and run to Mexico on a very spintery railroad tie.

[Dan S]

Sorry, ed, didn't mean to run my irony over your head.

IANAL, but I ain't stupid. Most days.

:)

[Dan S]

The wonderful thing about this case to be is that the evidence is already entered in the public record.

I think Nifong as redefined the emerging neologism: to nifong.

Instead of "to railroad accused into false charged based on contrived 'evidence' and grandstand trial-by-media in support of advancing one's own political career," I suspect the definition will become "to self-condemn oneself in the public record in the course of attempting to condemn others."

Or is that one already taken? ('to fitz')

Yeah, "self-condemn oneself" is redundant. But reading this thing is pretty redundantly condemning too.

[Dan S]

Voila!

276, Nifong's failure to provide a complete report of the results of all examination and tests conducted by DSI was in violation of the United States Constitution, N.C. Gen. Stat. 15A-282, N.C. Stat. 15A-903(a)(1), N.C. Gen. Stats. 15A-903(a)(a), and the Court's June 22, 2006 order compelling discovery.

Yeah, we're a little past ethical violations.

[maryrose]

NiFong is done in North Carolina as a practicing attorney. He attempted a bridge too far in attempting to bolster his re-election bid on the backs of the Duke lacrosse players. By trusting a lying grifter he has subsequently ruined his life.

[Dan S]

"By trusting a lying grifter he has subsequently ruined his life."

No, I must disagree. It wasn't his trust that ruined his life. It was his violation of the public trust and the law.

[Dan S]

Well, they conclude in asking for disciplinary action before the bar. Considering they alledge violation of the U.S. Constitution, that confuses me a bit. Why aren't they recommending prosecution as opposed to "disciplinary action"? No standing?

[PaulV]

"Durhan and Group of 88 lynch mob attack on Duke laxmen"

[clarice]

Outside the scope of their charge, Dan..that's for the governor and state atty general.
I love KC but he's been for Gonzales' intervention, and personally I think that should happen only after it is clear that North Carolina will not act to clean it's own house-I am at heart a federalist.

Perhaps that case, the Earle business and the Libby case will cause courts to more carefully scrutinize prosecutors. So often the people prosecuted are unpopular defendants that we pay no attention to prosecutorial excesses and those are as dangerous as anything I can think of.

[Dan S]

Thanks, Clarice.

So they are stating their opinion that the Constitution was violated, but not making any recommendation there because it's not their turf. (I'm a poor bureaucrat, despite working as a consultant... I never quite understand why getting the job done comes after these little issues of turf.)

I knee-jerk Federalism. But I'm heartened at the moment by the specifics cited here that appear substantial enough to ensure SOMETHING gets done, if not by the state, then by the Feds since there's a clear angle. My hope would be that the state cleans up its own mess. Too many Federal camels' noses in way too many tents already.

And I agree absolutely with your last para. This convergence of examples is a bit... scary.

[sylvia]

Well I think the guy should have handed over all the results. That is his problem. However, just because he didn't do all he was supposed to do, and the defense played a good game of "gotcha", does not mean that that automatically means the defendants are innocent, like everyone seems to imply.

The defendants have some good lawyers that were successful in scrutinizing all the procedures of the case and finding something to call Nifong out on. I wouldn't be surprised if similar things happen all the time in courtrooms, and unless you happen to be lucky enough to have a good lawyer uncover this, it goes unnoticed.

For instance, the OJ defense lawyers were successful in bringing up "chain of custody" issues about the blood evidence, and thereby giving the jurors an excuse to go with reasonable doubt to question whether the detectives really did find the blood where they said they found the blood. In probably 99% of other cases prior to that, that had never been an issue. So the lawyers played a good game of "gotcha". Does that mean we believe OJ is then innocent?

The DNA results from other men are arguably not material to the case and Nifong will have to argue that he didn't consider the DNA results "exculpatory" because the fact that she had sex with other people in the days before the event should not be relevant and was part of her privacy. After all the defense has never claimed that she was raped by other unknown people in the house. You don't have to be a virgin to get raped and why should the whole world get to know who you had sex with before you bring a rape charge if it has no relevance to the case? That would be one more unfair block on women reporting rape.

So anyway, that's what Nifong can try to argue. Whether he will be successful with that, I don't know. I think he can be successful enough with that claim that I doubt he will be disbarred because of that - probably just reprimanded. But like OJ, that doesn't translate into not guilty.

[donald]

Sylvia, OJ got off because of racial bias in the jury. I watched that entire trial, and there is no doubt to anybody with more than a brain stem he was guilty. Please. As for the Duke railroading case, man you're vapid. And a chain yanker I suspect.

[j]

According to David Freeman, Nifong's attorney, Nifong is "...devastated. It's very upsetting to be attacked. … It's like he's public enemy No. 1."

Well, now he knows how he made the Duke lacrosse players feel.

[Dan S]

Sylvia,

Very, very, VERY weak. I'm betting you didn't read the Bar's document. They not only cite incidents, they cite a LONG pattern of repeated and varied violations over a period of about eight months. And the Bar is not known for hanging its members out in the dessicating breeze and glaring sun.

I sure hope you're wrong about "this goes on all the time." At least one prosecutor that I respect says, "no, it doesn't." That's not to say it never happens (we have too many examples at the moment), but when it does and we catch it we need to make examples of those perpetrating this sort of abuse.

How many of his other cases were handled this way? Are you okay with innocents in jail due to prosecutor's misconduct?

I not only hope he's disbarred, I hope he has a nice vacation on the state.

[sylvia]

Well Dan S, I read the news accounts of his violations that amounted to supposed prejudicial statements and refusal to turn over "exculpatory" evidence. These are hardly varied - it several instances of the same type of thing occurring. The bar will have to make a case that the statements were actually "prejudicial" and that the results were actually "exculpatory" and to what degree they were so.

As to "Donald" anyone who uses insulting words such as "vapid" etc, without backing it up, without even a morsel of logic, is most likely a spoofer. I know their game and I know that they're on here. So if your aim is to get enjoyment out of a reaction of some sort of emotional pain from random people out of that, ala mini serial killer fashion (okay not the same, but same basic concept), you're off-base. I have been inured to the ways of spoofers many moons ago. It's just too bad we have to deal with these viruses messing up the discussions. I say - get therapy.

[Hey]

Sylvia: It doesn't matter what the evidence was. NC requires total disclosure of everything that comes up during the investigation, precisely to avoid "exculpatory" gamesmanship by prosecutors. Nifong violated explicit NC state law when he didn't turn over the file and when he tried to keep things out of the file by not taking notes. Don't go Wendy Murphying this.

Further, her behavior in the week preceding the event is explicitly material. She stated that she hadn't had sex in a week, and then only with her boyfriend. Any evidence of trauma would then implicate at least someone at the LAX party. Any evidence that impeaches that claim goes to credibility and reasonable doubt. You appear to be willfully ignorant of what rape shield laws do: they protect against claims that the victim must have been asking for it based on her dress or her past behaviour. Countering statements made by the complainant are admissable. Since this case has competing claims as to whether there was any sexual contact, "privacy" and rape shield concepts don't come into play.

Think of an regular assault. The accused could claim that he thought the complainant was looking for a fight and had a history of getting into fights, so it was consensual rather than an attack. This would be a situation for "boxing shield" to come in. The accused could say that he didn't touch the complainant, that there was no fight, and that the complainant was actually in 5 WBF undercard bouts in the 3 days before their meeting and that's why he looked so beaten up. Finding blood and epithelials from 5 different men on the complainant but none from the accused would then be admissable to impeach the credibility of the complaint.

Overall you're just a vapid troll. I just wanted to correct the record so that no one reading this thread was confused as to why Nifong will be disbarred or why the players are innocent. Maybe you're just as skanky a ho as the complainant, who had "DNA" from 5 men on her body when examined, including in her rectum, none of which matched anyone at the party. The lab tech did manage to contaminate the samples with his own DNA but could not find any evidence of the players, whether it be in an intimate part of her body or under her finger nails. The complainant specifically alleged up until late December that the supposed attackers had ejaculated in and on her, so the fact that no DNA could be found is meaningful.

The only positive result for DNA was that one of the accused's DNA was found on a towel in the bathroom of his house. None of the complainants DNA was found on the towel. A false fingernail belonging to the victim was found in his trash (several weeks after the party) that may have come in contact with his DNA. This was his bathroom trashcan, which would have been lousy with his DNA from a variety of sources. Nifong swore to the court that a "no match" would exonerate the players. He lied then, he continued to lie, and he's lieing now.

[sylvia]

hey Hey@hey.com (great email address). Look your games do not fool me. I'm sure there are many trolls on here but your insults are one dead giveaway of a troll, as most people are not that idiotic. So give it up dude. Again, get some therapy.

[Dan S]

Sylvia, read the Bar's statement.

News reports are not exactly best sources. It's linked in the heading post. The news reporting surrounding this has been pretty bad, on the whole (what else is new?)

THEN tell us Nifong wasn't WAY over the line. The evidence he himself entered into the record, with regards to the case, is stark. He was trying to play games, and in doing so he lied, misrepresented, denied, lied, spun, lied, and lied more. And the Bar says he did. And they cite his lies. And contradicting statements and evidence.

[Tim Schultz]

Sylvia-

I know trying to persuade you on this is likely fruitless, but if you read the Bar's accusations, it becomes clear (from neutral sources) just how bad Nifong's behavior has been in this case.

Now, a person might say: "yes, but a corrupt prosecutor doesn't mean that the defendants are not guilty." And I agree with that, at least in theory. But in this particular case, Nifong's extraordinary actions lead one to ask:

Why, if these guys are guilty, does the prosecutor need to engage in a monthlong series of lying to the public, the court, and the defense?

Why does he need to engage in a monthlong effort to suppress evidence that any first year law student would know must be turned over to the defense?

Why, when that evidence is finally discovered and turned over, would he need to send his investigator to re-interview the accuser who now suddenly remembers a version of events that now conforms to the physical evidence (which Nifong has known about all along)?

This isn't like OJ, where defense lawyers are doing the standard "who handled the evidence and when" chain-of-custody challenge to allege tampering/tainting. This is where a prosecutor is directing witnesses to cover up obviously relevant evidence, and that goes directly to "reasonable doubt." It's not just some little issue he has with the Bar Committee. it goes to the credibility of the case against the Duke Defendants.

[donald]

Spoof? Where's your proof?

[donald]

Oh, and the facts of this case and it's unraveling have been slapping up against your chin like a...well, you know for a while now. You don't seem to be able to see that big throbbing member spewing all over your face. Sorry all, I have a problem with suffering fools gladly.