Harr v. WRAL-5 News: in Federal Court

Mainstream media - a cog in the Durham prosecutor's wheel of conspiracy against Mangum

Word count: 2,639

In order to pull off a first degree murder charge against Crystal Mangum in the death of her boyfriend Reginald Daye, Durham prosecutors had to rely upon four conspiratorial contingents because their case against the Duke Lacrosse victim/accuser was weak to the point of being non-existent.

The Durham prosecutors were seeking a life sentence in their vendetta prosecution against Mangum as payback for her role in the Duke Lacrosse case… and they knew, or should have known, that Mangum acted in self defense and that the stab wound played no part in Daye’s death.

In actuality, Mangum was the domestic violence victim of an intoxicated Mr. Daye during the early Sabbath morning hours of April 3, 2011. Prosecution discovery confirms that she sustained blows to the head, fingernail gouges to the face, clumps of hair forcibly pulled from her scalp, and that a locked bathroom door was battered off its frame by Daye, enraged by jealousy.

The incident’s terminal event was a single stab wound with a steak knife by Mangum into Daye’s left side, which she claims was an act of desperation as her attacker was atop her with his hands around her neck strangling her.

Daye’s emergency surgery at Duke University Hospital was a success, as trauma surgeons repaired the laceration to the colon and minor lesion to the spleen. Postoperative prognosis was for a full recovery.

On the third post-op day, complications from delirium tremens led to Daye’s transfer to the intensive care unit where a determination was made to intubate him in order to protect his airway and provide oxygen.

Unfortunately, the 8 mm endotracheal tube was placed into the esophagus instead of the trachea, which resulted in Daye’s brain death. Misplacement of the tube was recognized after Daye went into cardiac arrest and cardiopulmonary resuscitation was begun. This included removing the errantly positioned tube and replacing it with another… according to records this tube being 7.5 mm in diameter. With its proper placement, oxygen flow was restored to the lungs, blood, and cells of the body and the heart recovered. The brain did not, and Mr. Daye remained in a coma.

After a week of observation without signs of improvement, the medical staff at Duke University Hospital electively removed Daye from life support after which he died… the stabbing and its treatment playing no part in his demise.

To confront the challenge of dismissing the reality of Reginald Daye’s death and instead placing the blame on Crystal Mangum, prosecutors required the cooperation of the following four entities: (1) the medical examiner; (2) Mangum’s defense counsel; (3) the mainstream media; and (4) the enablers.

The medical examiner, Dr. Clay Nichols, was required to produce a false and misleading autopsy report upon which would serve as the foundation for the prosecution’s murder charge against Mangum. This fraudulent document would divert responsibility for Daye’s death from Duke University Hospital to Crystal Mangum.

Mangum’s defense counsel would be called upon to ignore the serious faults in the autopsy report as well as Duke University Hospital’s hand in Daye’s death. If a conviction seemed unattainable, these turncoat lawyers’ plan B would be to convince their client to accept a plea deal with the harshest terms possible.

Mainstream media’s role was to keep the masses uninformed and ignorant of the true facts and realities of the autopsy report and Daye’s death. Its purpose was to poison the potential jury pool against Mangum and to go after her supporters without giving them fair representation or voice.

Enablers are the politicians, civil rights activists and organizations, clergy, and other community leaders who lack Nifongian courage to speak up or take action in this morality play.

However, of the four plotters in lot with the Durham prosecutors, it is the mainstream media faction that most influences the attitudes, thoughts, and opinions of the populous… unfairly and adversely against Crystal Mangum.

It cannot be said that the media was unaware of Mangum’s plight and the fact that the Durham murder charge against her was based on a purposefully flawed autopsy report because I personally notified them in writing… as early as November 2011 – a mere three weeks after the official autopsy report on Reginald Daye was released to the public.

In April 2012, I reached out to local media with letters detailing the fraud and injustice… in particular I contacted WRAL-5 News, ABC-11 News, NBC-17 News, The News & Observer, and Capitol Broadcasting Company… a mega-media conglomerate whose holdings include WRAL-5 and Fox-50 News.

Nationally and outside of North Carolina, I attempted to engage the Associated Press, USA Today, Thomson-Reuters News Service, The Washington Post, and The Washington Times.

In September 2012, I forwarded copies of a handwritten letter by Mangum, who was still incarcerated, to members of the local media… a document in which she professed her innocence and alluded to discrepancies between the autopsy report and other medical records.

The mainstream media, both local and national took no action regarding my passionate entreaties, and did not even have the courtesy to respond to them. It was truly as though they were acting in unison… as one giant whole in ignoring me and my concerns.

View the conclusion of this fvog in Part Two for a complete understanding of how the media plays its Jedi mind-tricks on the people, regarding the Mangum murder case, by their omission, obfuscation, misdirection, inaction, and outright falsehoods.

The media has two basic and important functions in society. The first is informative… to present news, ideally, in a fair and completely objective manner. Its second function is to help protect the masses and preserve democratic principles and ideals by exposing corruption and injustice through its investigative and editorializing branches. Only when armed with knowledge, do the people truly have direction.

The mainstream media fails miserably when it comes to dealing with the Crystal Mangum murder case. Since the wee morning hours of April 3, 2011 self-defense stabbing incident, the mainstream media has generally let down its viewers and readers in the following four ways: (1) concealment, or cover-up; (2) misrepresentation and diversionary reporting; (3) failure to investigate; and (4) refusal to editorialize.

A prime example of concealment is the across the board media silence regarding Reginald Daye’s weeklong coma. Even after Daye’s death on April 13, 2011, following his removal from life-support, most local media failed to mention that his death was preceded by a seven day coma. Of course, the event at Duke University Hospital that precipitated Daye’s brain death… the esophageal intubation… is rarely mentioned.

Mainstream media is aware that the autopsy report on Daye that was produced by the North Carolina Deputy Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Clay Nichols is false and misleading in its findings and conclusion, but yet it secrets this from their subscribers.

Misrepresentation and diversion go hand in hand with the media’s concealment in reporting on Mangum. One of the most egregious examples of both comes from an Associated Press article released around February 20, 2013 which stated, “The 34-year-old mother is representing herself in court, saying she killed Daye in self-defense.” Crystal Mangum told me that she never stated that she “killed Daye…” She said she never used the word “kill.” I was not at that hearing and do not have its transcripts, but I believe that Mangum did not accept responsibility for Daye’s death as she is aware that Duke University Hospital staff’s esophageal intubation led to his brain death and subsequent removal from life support.

Using the word “kill” was neither negligent nor sloppy reporting, but rather a calculated move to make it appear as though Mangum concedes that she is responsible for Daye’s death and that her defense is solely one of self defense. In this not-so-subtle way, the media is diverting attention from questions regarding the cause of his death to focusing on the issue of self-defense… thereby omitting the medical examiner and Duke University Hospital from the equation. In other words, the media is attempting to protect the medical examiner, Dr. Clay Nichols, and Duke University Hospital.

The previous paragraph is also false and misleading with its statement, “Crystal Mangum was released Wednesday from the Durham County jail, where she had been held since her April 2011 arrest for the fatal stabbing of Reginald Daye.” The term “fatal stabbing” is absolutely incorrect as the stab wound was non-life threatening and was successfully treated with emergency surgery. The stab wound had nothing to do with Daye’s death, but the Associated Press is deliberately trying to put in the mind of the people that it directly caused his demise. Daye’s descent into delirium tremens is the event that led to his fatally errant intubation. An example of the media using Jedi-mind tricks on the masses.

The article’s opening paragraph began, “The woman who falsely accused three Duke University lacrosse players of raping her…” This routinely used media preface is false in itself, as it was never proven as fact that Mangum was not sexually assaulted at the 2006 Duke Lacrosse party… and Ms. Mangum has consistently maintained that she was. By attaching the label of false accuser to Mangum, the media is poisoning the potential jury pool against her in her upcoming trial. The media wants jurors at her trial to disregard her story or any testimony she may give.

The fourth of five paragraphs can be adjudged to be the most accurate and it reads as follows: “In 2006, Mangum claimed Duke lacrosse players gang raped her at a team party where she was hired as a stripper.” Although not necessarily misleading it fails to mention the following facts: (1) the Duke lacrosse player who called the escort service to arrange for the entertainment used an alias, contracted the dancers under false pretenses stating it was for a small bachelor party of four or five rather than a beer-guzzling keg party of fifty or more; (2) the client requested Caucasian dancers, but the escort service sent two African American women; and (3) partygoers shouted the n-word racial epithet at Mangum as she was leaving. The exclusion of these facts deprives the article of balance.

The first sentence of the final paragraph reads, “The three arrested were eventually declared innocent by North Carolina's attorney general after Mangum's story crumbled and her mental stability was called into question.” Although technically the three may have been under arrest, by using the word “arrested” the media is subtly attempting to engender reader sympathy for the three by imply that they served time in jail… which they did not!

It then states that they were declared innocent by the NC attorney general… something which is irrelevant as he has no such legal authority, and to do so is irresponsible and unprecedented. The media has constantly misled the public on this important issue. The last sentence stating the prosecutor, former Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong, championed her case. Mr. Nifong no more championed her case than Prosecutors Gauger and Coggins-Franks are championing the case of Reginald Daye’s family in the murder case against Ms. Mangum. Words matter, and to use the word “champion” in referring to Nifong’s prosecution of the case is, again misleading and calculated. The only thing that Mike Nifong championed as a prosecutor was the cause of equal justice for all.

In other words, he didn’t make exceptions and allow “rare deals” when the defendants hailed from families of wealth, power, and privilege… and he didn’t give “raw deals” to suspects who were poor, disenfranchised, and people of color.

It was because Mr. Nifong was a prosecutor of uncommon independence and integrity that he was disbarred because of the Duke Lacrosse case… the only prosecutor to be disbarred by the North Carolina State Bar in its eighty year existence. Again, something that the article omitted.

Unfortunately, the Associated Press version is the one that is utilized by media outlets nationwide… including the Huffington Post.

WRAL-5 News, ABC-11 News, The News & Observer, and other media proclaim to be deeply involved in investigative work… for the purpose of protecting the people. That’s the way it should be, but that is not the reality… especially when it comes to Crystal Mangum.

Jim Goodmon, the President and CEO of Capitol Broadcasting Company, was contacted on April 24, 2012, with a letter about the injustices against Crystal Mangum. He was alerted to the fact that the autopsy report on Reginald Daye, which was the basis for the murder charge against Mangum, was fraudulent. Other local mainstream media were notified about discrepancies with the autopsy report at that time, as well… but none bothered to investigate, much less respond.

Recently, The News & Observer, a McClatchy newspaper, along with other local media, has focused its investigative spotlight on former UNC-Chapel Hill football coach Butch Davis. The media even went to court in order to obtain copies of his personal cell phone records so they could see if a tutor called him.

The media’s investigative arm also seems to have spent a lot of time, money, and resources delving into who paid the parking tickets for the Tar Heel football player.

And, of course, the African American Studies program at UNC has been scapegoated by the investigative press for allowing the school’s athlete’s to remain eligible to play by providing courses that are not considered academically challenging enough.

Yet, when the integrity of a justice system is on the line… for example, a prosecutor who is in collusion with a medical examiner in manufacturing a fraudulent autopsy report in order to trump up a murder charge against an innocent mother of three… then the mainstream media is simply not interested… especially when the defendant is Crystal Mangum.

Op-ed pieces provide a forum for public discourse that helps engage subscribers in meaningful thought on topics of relevance and importance. Opinions can be enlightening, and they can serve to alter or enhance attitudes and views. It is a valuable media tool.

Since Crystal Mangum’s arrest on April 3, 2011, there has been no editorial view from the staff of The News & Observer about Crystal Mangum’s case. No mention about the problems with the inconsistencies about the autopsy report on Reginald Daye. No mention about the refusal of the defense expert forensic pathologist to provide Mangum with a written report. No mention about Duke University Hospital’s culpability in Daye’s death… nothing.

John Drescher, the editor of The News & Observer, frequently editorializes, but again, he refuses to broach the subject of Mangum’s mistreatment.

I don’t hold Mr. Drescher at fault for the way Mangum is represented, misrepresented, or not represented in his newspaper because I know him. In my opinion he is a fine person who I like and respect. I even gave him a cameo in my comic strip, “The MisAdventures of Super-Duper Cooper” – not an honor that is indiscriminately bestowed.

As with all media outlets, be they television, radio, online, or print, it is the people at the very top who make policy that determines how the news is reported. Newpaper editors, news anchors, and news reporters are accountable to the CEOs of the companies for which they work.

A broad scale national conspiracy is possible only at the top of networks and publishing corporations with transactions regarding policy then filtering down to local stations and newspapers.

… and that conspiracy by the mainstream media, to protect the medical examiner and Duke University Hospital, has long been in effect – since April 2011 – and it has been extremely effective. 

Mainstream media’s big role in the conspiracy against Crystal Mangum

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The truth will set Crystal Mangum free. That is a proposition of which I have been a proponent for some time. Durhamians and Tar Heelians would put a kibosh on the baseless and vendetta-driven criminal charges against Crystal Mangum (the Duke Lacrosse victim/accuser) if they only knew the truth about events of April 3, 2011, that were responsible for Mangum’s current entanglement with the law. But the masses are ignorant of the truth… in the dark, left standing amidst the shadows of a moonless night. The reason for the misguided opinions and sentiments surrounding this injustice is due to actions and inactions of the mainstream media… all acting in concert with one another and their fellow co-conspirators. Media’s main contribution to the conspiracy against Mangum is to keep the truth hidden… buried deep beneath diversions, misstatements, selective omissions, misinterpretations, and outright lies. Instead of acting as a torch of enlightenment in the Mangum case, it has been functioning as a shroud to strike the death knell for justice.

For the prosecution to be able to bring such bogus and baseless charges against Ms. Mangum, with a straight face, requires the devoted participation of four additional center-stage actors: (1) the medical examiner (to provide the fraudulent autopsy report upon which to base the prosecution); (2) extremely pliable turncoat defense attorneys (to look the other way, pull punches, and advise against Mangum’s best self-interests); (3) enablers (individuals and organizations [NAACP, ACLU, etc.] who are in a position to do or say something to positively impact the situation, but elect to remain silent… mostly out of fear, having learned their lessons from the persecution of former Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong); and (4) the mainstream media. Of the aforementioned four, the media is one of the crooked prosecution’s most valued allies because of the influence it has over the public… a public that for the most part places a great deal of trust in the media to provide honest and accurate reporting.

Although the mainstream media has been charged with being a public watchdog, to expose corruption in government and business that adversely affects the civilian citizens, when it comes to the Duke Lacrosse case or any of its participants, all bets are off. The driving force behind the remarkable unity of all media outlets stems from the fact that Rae Evans, mother of one of the Duke Lacrosse defendants, was an executive at CBS News for more than a decade. Afterward, she founded a highly successful Washington DC public relations firm of which she is president and CEO. In addition, her husband is an attorney in a prestigious DC law firm. As strong as her ties are to the other media outlets, there is no doubt that she possesses sway as to how stories are spun, and she has not kept her feelings hidden. During an interview with CBS’s “60 Minutes” show, Ms. Evans stated that she wanted Mr. Nifong to “pay every day for the rest of his life” (as retribution for his having the audacity to prosecute her son and the other lacrosse players). Defying journalistic codes of good standards, CBS never disclosed Ms. Evans’ ties to the station during any of its programs which featured its biased stories about the Duke Lacrosse case.

Another factor which drives the selective, skewed, and one-sided reporting of the Crystal Mangum case is the media’s desire to protect Duke University’s reputation and to mitigate the civil liability which Durham has self-inflicted upon itself with its unjust treatment of Mangum. The quandary at the root of the murder charge against Mangum is the fact that Reginald Daye’s death was not caused by the stab wound inflicted by Mangum. An unrelated botched intubation by Duke University Hospital staff, which resulted in brain death, led to Daye’s elective removal from life support… the proximate cause of his death. The media, through the prosecution’s charge against Mangum, has done its best to shift blame for Daye’s death from the Duke hospital, where it truly belongs, to Crystal Mangum.

Shortly after the stabbing of Reginald Daye by his live-in companion Mangum, the mainstream media flourished with articles about the stabbing, ABC-11 even falsely stating that Daye was repeatedly stabbed by Mangum. Lacking a lot of specifics, especially Mangum’s side of the story, the media devoted little attention to the incident itself, and focused much on the so-called “2010 arson” incident involving Mangum, and her role in the Duke Lacrosse case… never failing to misleadingly mention that the Duke Lacrosse defendants were declared “innocent.” Mangum was represented by media as emotionally unstable, mentally ill, and a perpetual prevaricator with a penchant for being physically violent with her boyfriends… none of which is true. On the other hand, the media hid from the public Reginald Daye’s criminal history (which included assault on a female), the fact that he was an alcoholic, and that he was highly intoxicated at the time of the incident. The media never bothered to mention that Mangum sustained physical injuries, including a swollen lower lip and a cut around her left eye. Nor did the media report findings at the scene of the incident which included clumps of Mangum’s hair, and a bathroom door that had been kicked in by Daye. In fact, the media, at all times, painted Mr. Daye in the most positive light.

As the media became more aware of the weaknesses in the prosecution’s case, its coverage of the case markedly diminished. On the third postoperative night, after Duke University Hospital staff intubated the esophagus rather than the trachea which resulted in Daye’s comatose state, the media went into a self-imposed news embargo on the subject. For a week, while Daye lay in a coma, the media kept the public in the dark as to the serious and significant turn of events in Daye’s medical condition. It was not until after Daye died a week later that the people were even informed about the fact that Daye had been in a weeklong coma. A suddenly apathetic media all of a sudden had no curiosity as to how Daye’s condition dramatically evolved from “expected to make a full recovery” to “irreversible brain-damaged induced coma.” Instead, the media placed the blame for Daye’s death on Mangum… never mentioning the botched intubation and, with the exception of only one media source, not mentioning that Daye was even on life support and that his elective removal from it preceded his death.

There was a flurry of media activity when the autopsy report was released to the public four months after it was written by Medical Examiner Clay Nichols. The media falsely proclaimed to the people that the stab wound inflicted by Mangum perforated “six” organs… the left lung, the diaphragm (not an organ, but a muscle), the left kidney, the stomach, the spleen, and the colon. As I revealed online in the operative report I procured from prosecution discovery, only the spleen and colon were damaged by the knife wound. In addition, other medical reports from prosecution discovery contradicted that Daye sustained any lesions to his left upper extremity which Dr. Nichols interpreted as being “defensive injuries.” Although the lack of credibility of the autopsy report by Nichols was brought to the attention of the mainstream media, they never attempted to question its accuracy or to set the record straight. Instead, the media chose to let their readers and viewers continue to believe that Daye’s death was due to the perforation of six organs by a single stab wound to the torso with a steak knife.

Specifically, I made contact with WRAL and its investigative team (including manager Randall Kerr), and ABC-11 at its downtown Raleigh studio, to enlighten them about the problems with the Daye autopsy report by Dr. Nichols. I even hand-delivered a letter to Jim Goodmon, the president and CEO of Capital Broadcasting Company which owns WRAL and FOX 50 among other media holdings. Per the usual response I have received from the media, I was ignored. As I was aware, the problem was not that the media did not know that what they reported regarding the autopsy report was incorrect and misleading, but that they did not want the general public to know. Such is still the case as the media continues to ignore the injustices in Mangum’s plight.

Another tactic utilized by the media is to not so subtly defile supporters of Mangum by presenting them as being lawless, unstable, and irresponsible. The headlines may blare that “Mangum supporter is being investigated by the State Bar,” but it is that which is underlying that story that is concealed. When approaching her one year anniversary of incarceration with no activity by her attorney of record, Mangum requested my assistance in drafting motions for her. I innocently drafted three motions based upon prosecution discovery that she sent me. She signed the motions and I filed them with the court. According to the State Bar, more than one journalist complained about me practicing law without a license… which propelled the Bar to investigate me. In order to conceal the identities of the journalists, the Bar itself assumed the role of the complainant in the action against me. Although the alleged wrongdoing against me was trivial and petty, the media, and the State Bar both made a mountain out of this tiny molehill. Diversion ruled the day, as the media brought attention to the alleged unauthorized practice of filing the motions (even questioning whether or not Mangum knowledge or consent for their filings), while disregarding the issues addressed by contents of the motions.

The selective and biased reporting by the media is not without severe consequences with respect to the administration of justice. Its role in the conspiracy against Mangum has helped keep a person innocent of committing a crime (and actually being a victim of crimes against her by Daye) incarcerated for 505 days as of today’s posting… and counting. The media is doing a disservice to Ms. Mangum, to Lady Justice, to the cause of “equal justice for all,” and to the public which reads its reports and views its broadcasts. In all fairness I do not fault reporters, news anchors, managers, and editors on the lower rungs of the media business, as the policies regarding how stories about Mangum are to be presented are determined by those at the top. Mr. Goodmon, as president and CEO is to be held accountable, rather than anchor David Crabtree, for example. Presidents and CEOs of ABC-11 and NBC-17 are guilty of failing in their duty to the public, as well. The media conspiracy in this Mangum criminal issue is long on fidelity and ubiquitous throughout the country.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t help persuade the mainstream media to do the right thing when enablers, such as politicians, retired judges, the governor, the Attorney General’s Office, civil rights leaders and organizations, including the North Carolina Coalition Against Domestic Violence, sit on their hands and allow their mouths to be muzzled. Only the Committee on Justice for Mike Nifong is speaking out against the injustice towards Crystal Mangum… and as would be expected, the media has gone out of its way to minimize the group and discredit it whenever possible.

The media’s handling of the Crystal Mangum case has been disgraceful, and its subscribers and the public at large deserve better. 