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http://www.justice4nifong.com/direc/flog/flog14.html
Part One – An accurate retelling of events leading to Harr’s legal action against Duke
Honesty and fairness are the two most important characteristics for any judge to possess. In his November 16, 2011 recommendation to the Court, United States Magistrate Judge P. Trevor Sharp demonstrated his lack of both by flat out lying to the Court with the intention of misleading the Court for the purpose of achieving a ruling in favor of the defendants from Duke University. That the Duke defendants’ defense against the discrimination complaint made by the Plaintiff Sidney B. Harr was extremely weak was evidenced by the magistrate judge’s unethical conduct in propping up defendants’ position with lies.
Because of the well-known prejudice of the mainstream media against Mike Nifong, Crystal Mangum, Nifong supporters and others considered by the Powers-That-Be to be on the wrong end of the Duke Lacrosse case, the public at large is unfamiliar with the discriminatory and malicious acts of Duke University on April 14, 2010. A concise review of this important case will ensue.
Prior to that date of April 14, 2010, Sidney Harr, the Lay Advocate for the Committee on Justice for Mike Nifong, had visited Duke University on numerous occasions… as an invited guest to public conferences, a book-signing, and other public forums. Harr also at times ventured onto the grounds to say “hello” to a few of his friends, including Law Professor James Coleman and Political Science Chair Mike Munger. In addition Harr had taken in cultural events offered at the Nasher Museum, which is situated on Duke University property, as well as having sat in attendance at Easter mass in the Duke Cathedral.
Harr enjoyed and valued his visits to the Duke campus – whether for enjoyment, enlightenment, or both – and even stated as much. After attending a three day John Hope Franklin conference at Duke Law School on Law, Politics, and Race, Harr took the time to write letters to the university President Richard Brodhead and law school dean David Levi, expressing his appreciation for the wonderful programs that Duke produced for the public’s benefit. Because Harr had previously placed President Brodhead in his educational comic strip, “The MisAdventures of Super-Duper Cooper,” he wanted to assure that President Brodhead harbored no ill will, so he was sure to show other comic strip examples in which Harr utilized self-deprecating humor.
Harr also went to great lengths to express his view that even though he was a supporter of former Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong, that that had nothing to do with his attitude towards Duke University… which at the time was full of nothing but admiration.
And finally, to show his support for the programs Duke put on for the public, Harr wrote in his letters that he planned on attending the interview of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer… which was scheduled two days later, on April 14, 2010. What is so diabolical about this is that the information that Harr gave of his intention to be in attendance at the April 14th event was used to set a trap in which to arrest Harr for trespassing. The apparent animosity which led the Duke University officials to plot to place Harr behind bars was the fact that he was a well known and outspoken supporter of Mike Nifong. That Harr is an African American also entered into their designs to have him incarcerated, as the criminal justice system in the Tar Heel state is quick to place innocent black people in jail with impunity… even without justification or cause. The arrest of Knightdale resident Carletta Alston, who was held in jail for twelve months by Wake County prosecutor Tom Ford, is a prime example.
Because Harr sent the complimentary letters on Monday, April 12, 2010, he assumed that they would have reached Duke University the morning of Wednesday, April 14th, the day of the event. Harr believed that on that particular morning, both defendants Brodhead and Levi would have been busy with preparations for their distinguished guest, and would not have had the luxury of engaging in a plot against him. He surmised that one of their assistants, probably that of Dean Levi, cooked up the scheme and ordered the security guard to initially confront Harr and then call in the Duke campus police to make the arrest.
Now, had the letter reached Duke University a day earlier, on Tuesday, April 13, 2010, then that would have given defendants Brodhead and Levi ample time to become involved in the skullduggery. Make no mistake that the security guard had been summoned for this mission by someone in the office of the recipients of Harr’s letters because Harr enclosed a “j4n” business card in both letters… and the security officer acknowledged having a “j4n” business card in his possession when he confronted Harr.
At the conclusion of the event, Harr exited the large room and was heading for the exit when he was approached by Tom Breen of the Associated Press. Mr. Breen proceeded to ask Harr of his impressions of interview with the justice. Was Mr. Breen in collusion… part of the conspiracy against Harr? Possibly, as of all the people in attendance, Harr was the only one he saw Mr. Breen interview… and Harr who sat near the front of the large standing room only crowd, was one of the final people to emerge from the room’s rear exit.
Per his custom, Harr always exchanged his business card with media-types when the opportunity arose, and so he and Mr. Breen traded business cards during their brief encounter, and Harr continued to walk towards the building’s exit for the purpose of catching a bus to return home to Raleigh. Before he could reach the exit door, Harr was intercepted by a uniformed security guard, K. Harris.
The security guard informed Harr that he would have to immediately leave the campus, but could not give a reason, stating only that the “building manager” ordered him to remove Harr from university property. Harr was moving with the guard towards the door while he tried to get an audience with the building manager or obtain an understanding from the guard for his being thrown off campus. Throughout the conversation, the guard kept threatening to arrest Harr… again without provocation. Because Harr’s behavior was no different from others similarly situated, he came to the immediate realization that he was being discriminated against because of his support for Mike Nifong. He also realized that his future visits to Duke University property and venues were in jeopardy… pending a satisfactory resolution… which at the moment seemed extremely remote.
As the security guard ushered Harr to the exit, Harr saw his friend, Duke Law Professor James Coleman, and flagged him down. With his audio recorder running Harr explained his predicament and Professor Coleman vigorously interceded with the guard on Harr’s behalf. Coleman also attempted to calm down Harr who was visibly upset at being asked to leave the campus. In a hurry to catch a plane, Professor Coleman brokered a settlement of sorts with the security guard before leaving. The brief intervention by Professor Coleman saved Harr from being arrested, as the Duke police had already been summoned by the security guard and he arrived shortly thereafter in a patrol car.
As if the incident within the building wasn’t embarrassing and humiliating enough, the uniformed guard and police officer closely followed Harr, despite his protestations, to the bus stop whereupon he caught a bus that would take him off Duke University property and to the downtown bus terminal… thus ending his campus nightmare.
It was obvious to Harr that any future return to Duke property would be dependent upon one of two things occurring. First, if Duke University was able to give a logical explanation for its treatment of Harr on April 14th, which was, in essence, exceedingly improbable. Secondly, if Duke University would accept responsibility for its misconduct and take other measures of restorative justice to see that mistreatment of Nifong supporters did not recur in the future. Harr was banking on the latter when he wrote individual letters in April and May of 2010 to President Brodhead, Dean Levi, and Pamela Bernard, the general counsel of Duke University.
All hopes for a resolution which would enable Harr to return to Duke campus without fear of being abused, harassed, and/or arrested, were dashed by a May 10, 2010 letter from the Duke University spokesman Mike Schoenfeld. Far from being conciliatory, the letter was accusatory… alleging that Harr had repeatedly violated its policy against solicitation by handing out business cards and asking their recipients to visit his website. This was the best excuse that Duke University could concoct for its mistreatment and near arrest of Harr. Correspondence between the parties concluded with May 15, 2010 letters by Harr to Brodhead, Levi, and Bernard in which he expressed his disapproval and dissatisfaction with Schoenfeld’s letter of May 10th.
During the ensuing months, Harr unsuccessfully tried to get civil rights organizations and individuals to intervene with Duke University on his behalf. On April 5, 2011, with the one year anniversary of the incident fast approaching, Harr reluctantly filed his complaint in federal court in order to protect his legal rights from any statute of limitation provisions.
Part 2 – Serious problems with Magistrate Judge Sharp’s recommendation to the Court
The complaint that Harr filed was based upon his civil rights being violated by Duke University for discriminating against him because of his beliefs, thoughts, opinions and allegiances… which were in favor of Mike Nifong. Because of his strongly held position regarding Mr. Nifong, Harr was singularly targeted in a conspiracy intended to culminate in his arrest… presumably on a trespassing charge, and most likely with other charges, such as interfering with a public officer, tacked on.
The defendants through their attorney from the Greensboro law firm of Ellis & Winters LLP, never denied the factual nature of the events stated by the plaintiff Harr, in large measure because Harr audio recorded much of his conversation with the security guard. From what I could ascertain from the confusingly esoteric legalese mumbo-jumbo spewed by Attorney J. Donald Cowan in his motion, the defense proffered by Duke was mainly that the named defendants were not involved in the April 14th incident, and that Duke University was not an agent of the state.
A timeline of events that followed Harr’s filing of his complaint on April 5, 2011 are as follows:
April 15, 2011 – the Defendants file a Motion to Dismiss the Plaintiff’s complaint;
May 6, 2011 – Plaintiff Harr files a Response to Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss;
May 16, 2011 – Defendants file a Response in Further Support of Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss;
May 20, 2011 – Harr sends a letter to the Court expressing his displeasure at being denied the opportunity to respond to the Defendants’ May 16, 2011 filing;
November 16, 2011 – Magistrate Judge P. Trevor Sharp files his Recommendation to the Court regarding the motion by the defense; and
December 8, 2011 – Harr files a timely response with the Court about the Recommendation of the Magistrate Judge.
The problem with Magistrate Judge P. Trevor Sharp’s Recommendation begins with the first sentence in the second paragraph in which he states: “The following factual allegations are made in Plaintiff’s complaint.” By allegedly basing the facts on statements made by the Plaintiff, he sets the stage in which the facts he is about to re-state are not likely to be in dispute by the Plaintiff.
On page two, line eight, the calculated lies begin with the following statement: “After the interview concluded, Plaintiff began handing out business cards of the Committee and was asked by a reporter for the Associated Press for an interview.” This is totally false as neither Harr, nor the Defendants’ stated that Harr began handing out business cards at the conclusion of the Justice Breyer interview. Specifically, Harr stated the following in his complaint:
“14. While waiting for the event, Plaintiff, per his usual custom when on the Duke campus, stopped by the office of Duke Law Professor James Coleman (hereinafter “COLEMAN”) to say “hello.” COLEMAN was not in his office, so Plaintiff returned to the building’s lobby to read his book.
15. While waiting and between stints of reading, Plaintiff struck up conversations with about a half dozen individuals, a few of whom were law students. Plaintiff handed out a few COMMITTEE business cards to some of the people with whom he had conversed, and collected business cards from those who had some.”
The complaint explicitly states that the cards were handed out while Harr was waiting for the interview to begin, and it further states that they were not handed out indiscriminately, but to those individuals with whom Harr was engaged in dialogue.
Magistrate Judge Sharp falsely states that “Plaintiff began handing out business cards of the Committee and was asked by a reporter for the Associated Press for an interview.” This is a fabrication because it suggests that the reporter Tom Breen witnessed Harr distributing cards, and as a result asked him for an interview. There is nothing in Plaintiff Harr’s complaint to suggest such a scenario. In fact, Harr’s complaint reads as follows:
“17. At the event’s conclusion, Plaintiff, who was seated about a third of the way in the front of the packed lecture hall, filed out of the large room en mass with others in attendance.
18. On leaving the room, a gentleman approached the Plaintiff and introduced himself as Tom Breen of the Associated Press. Plaintiff was under the assumption that he was randomly chosen by the reporter from the attendees to give his thoughts about the event. After briefly giving his opinions, the Plaintiff began telling Mr. Breen about his advocacy for NIFONG, and the two exchanged business cards.”
Magistrate Judge Sharp’s reconstruction of the event implied that Harr’s actions induced the reporter Mr. Breen to seek an interview with him. The truth, as stated in Harr’s complaint, is that Harr was leaving the room as others similarly situated when he was approached by Mr. Breen… and that he was not handing out business cards. In fact, per Harr’s complaint, the two were well into their brief conversation when the business cards were exchanged. Furthermore, the card Harr gave to Mr. Breen was the only business card he handed out after the conclusion of the Justice Breyer interview.
Finally, Magistrate Judge Sharp falsely states, “After this interview (with Mr. Breen), Duke campus security approached Plaintiff and advised him he would have to leave the campus. The security officer told Plaintiff that the ‘building manager’ was having him removed. When Plaintiff protested, the security officer called for campus police to meet them.” This, again, is a prevarication which is not substantiated in Harr’s complaint.
In this instance the interpretation of the word “protesting” is of vital importance and Magistrate Judge Sharp uses it to imply that Harr protested being removed from Duke property, as though he were an occupier. To appreciate the essence of the proper interpretation, it should be put into context as is stated in Harr’s complaint which follows:
“21. When Plaintiff asked SECURITY who was responsible for kicking him off campus, SECURITY replied, ‘the building manager.’ Plaintiff asked SECURITY to take him to see the building manager, and SECURITY refused.
22. As an upset and protesting Plaintiff was being escorted to the nearest exit of the building, Plaintiff saw COLEMAN and flagged him down in order to express what Plaintiff considered to be his unwarranted expulsion from the campus…”
That Harr was protesting his “treatment” is further evidenced in paragraph 23 which reads: “COLEMAN tried his best to defuse the issue and calm down Plaintiff who was highly indignant by his treatment.”
Magistrate Judge Sharp failed to mention that in Harr’s complaint, he stated that he was in compliance with the security guard with regards to leaving the campus. The magistrate judge also failed to mention that the security guard repeatedly threatened Harr with arrest. And the magistrate judge failed to mention Harr’s contention that Duke police was summoned without provocation. That paragraph reads as follows:
“26. Plaintiff who was not submissive but more agitated at his mistreatment – not unlike Harvard University’s Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. – was in compliance with SECURITY and walking towards the bus stop while seeking answers to why he was being kicked off the campus. Nonetheless, SECURITY continued to threaten Plaintiff with arrest, and then without provocation called in backup from Duke University campus police.”
That Harr protested his unwarranted and humiliating treatment by security is not at issue, and in itself did not warrant calling in police. The fact is that Harr never refused to leave Duke University property and even stated that he was in compliance with SECURITY.
Part 3 – Reasons behind the magistrate judge’s false and misleading statements
That the recommendation by Magistrate Judge Sharp contains false and misleading statements is indisputable, and directly questions the honesty of the magistrate judge. The reason that the magistrate judge misrepresented the facts of the complaint by Harr, is directly linked to his pronounced prejudice in favor of the defendants from Duke University… as the facts of the incident in question lay the groundwork for the conclusions drawn by the magistrate judge and the impressions developed by the Court upon which to make its rulings.
It is imperative that the re-stated facts be accurate, as they are the foundation upon which conclusions are made and decisions are reached. For example, in a June 17, 2007 online article titled: “Nifong’s punishment is extreme, appropritate,” by MSNBC Senior Legal Analyst Susan F. Filan, she states as fact that Mr. Nifong asked his son to attend his disciplinary hearing.
When notified of the passage, Mrs. Nifong emphatically stated that Ms. Filan’s statement was totally false. She went so far as to say that Mr. Nifong asked his son not to attend… but that his son insisted in order to show support for his beleaguered father.
Ms. Filan, using this untruthful premise as a basis, then reached the conclusion that he asked his son to come as a ploy in order to gain sympathy, leniency, and pity… and she trounces Mr. Nifong’s character and role as a father with the rhetorical question, “Why put your son through this?”
That the media is biased against Mike Nifong is clearly demonstrated by the fact that letters that pointed out these gross mistakes and mailed to NBC Universal President and CEO Jeff Zucker, MSNBC President Phil Griffin, Vice president and General Counsel Rick Cotton, and the MSNBC Legal Department were returned to the sender Harr unopened.
By misstating that Harr began handing out business cards upon the conclusion of the Justice Breyer interview, Magistrate Judge Sharp is trying to make a trespassing case for the defendants to use against Harr. When Harr was handing out the business cards prior to the interview, he was a guest of the campus waiting for the event, which was open to the public, to begin. However, upon the conclusion of the event, Harr was no longer under the umbrella of being an invited guest. The slack and misleading representation of Harr following the Justice Breyer interview is that of a peddler indiscriminately handing out business cards as though they were flyers being given to passersby.
With respect to reporter Tom Breen, Magistrate Judge Sharp implies that Harr’s alleged actions attracted Mr. Breen… not that the reality that Mr. Breen had targeted Harr and approached Harr as he was leaving the lecture room walking as those around him, and not talking or handing out cards.
Finally, Magistrate Judge P. Trevor Sharp takes the liberty of misinterpreting Harr’s statement that he was protesting his treatment by the security guard, and not refusing to leave the Duke University campus grounds. Harr’s statement goes so far as to state that he was complying with the security guards demands that he leave the campus.
A significant point here is that Harr was upset, agitated, and indignant at the unexpected and unwarranted turn of events following the Justice Breyer interview. It was during his confrontation with the security guard that two realizations were swiftly evident to Harr: (1) the actions taken against him were unleashed because he was a supporter of Mike Nifong; and (2) that unless a satisfactory resolution regarding this incident soon followed, that it was likely that he would never be able to return to any of Duke’s properties or venues. That Harr highly valued the programs and events offered at Duke University, and stated so in his letters of April 12, 2010 to defendants Brodhead and Levi, as well as is documented in his complaint, is confirmed by his reaction when he realized the implications of being asked by the security guard to leave the Duke campus. In other words, the damages sustained by Harr by Duke defendants’ actions are significant.
On the other hand, had Harr acted calmly and taken in stride his forced removal from the university campus, then one could more likely surmise that Duke’s mistreatment of Harr was of no major consequence to him. That Harr’s reaction tended to be more volatile is proportional to his perceived sense of loss and the damages he incurred.
What is extremely chilling and disappointing about the legal process thus far is that a magistrate judge would recommend to the Court that the legitimate complaint filed by Harr be dismissed… especially in lieu of the fact that Duke defendants’ actions were premeditated and filled with malice. The university’s response to the kind and complimentary words of Harr was to use the supportive information contained therein to cobble a scheme in which to place its author in jail… an action beyond cruel.
Part 4 – Why this case is important to everyone
The importance of this case cannot be emphasized enough, as its implications go far beyond actions suffered by Harr. This case has relevance for all citizens who go to private property that is a place of public accommodation. Although Duke University is a prime example, being a private institution on private property which holds many events for which it solicits the public to attend its campus buildings, museum, chapel, library, cathedral and other venues, what happen to Harr would have meaning for any private business catering to the public. For example, could a privately owned establishment on private property discriminate against a patron because of his/her belief regarding the death penalty, abortion, or any other controversial topic? Could a privately owned sports bar have a customer removed because his allegiance as displayed by his apparel is for a ball team other than the one favored by the proprietor? These examples are similar to the incident that happened to Harr on Duke’s campus in April 2010.
Duke University knows that it is on the wrong side of justice in this case, but feels that it can trample on the rights of most individuals because it has the media on its side, and to an extent, as recently revealed by Magistrate Judge Sharp’s recommendation, the courts. The media has had full knowledge of the discriminatory acts by Duke early on, but has refused to cover the story. That the mainstream media is under the control of Duke University in this particular instance, and that it can be unfairly controlled by those in powers, is evident. Duke has heavily relied upon the media to keep its disgraceful and embarrassing misconduct against Harr hidden from the public.
As a point of contrast, when two lesbians were asked by a security guard in 2010 to leave a shopping mall in Raleigh, North Carolina, because they briefly showed affection publicly, the media ran with the story… giving it extensive coverage in print and on air. Both locally, and nationally, and where it was even the topic of a cable news program. As a result, the offenders quickly acquiesced to the grievances of the lesbians, who had the full support of the ACLU, Gay and Lesbian groups, and others.
Harr on the other hand was blindsided by Duke University, wherein a premeditated conspiracy was launched against Harr with the intention of putting him behind bars… his offense, being a supporter of Mike Nifong… because of his beliefs, thoughts, and opinions. And not because of any actions committed by him. Yet, the media, acting in unison, has kept this egregious discriminatory act by Duke University secreted away.
Because the U.S. Magistrate Judge P. Trevor Sharp not only sided with defense attorneys for Duke, but felt the need to reinforce its weak defense with lies about facts of the case and misleading statements, it seems to me that Duke felt it has the courts, as well as the media, in its back pocket.
Ramifications of the Motion to Dismiss are far-reaching if Duke University is allowed to abuse it in court. The motion could be used by mammoth institutions and mega-corporations to fend off legitimate and worthy complaints by individuals they have wronged, by relying on the court to dismiss legal actions against them without the arguments even being heard by a jury. This would be the equivalent of giving Goliath a Kevlar body suit with riot headgear before sending him out to do battle with David. Talk about an uneven playing field…
But Harr is not fighting for any advantage, or even a level playing field. All he wants is the opportunity to engage Duke University and its defense team on the playing field. Despite Duke’s many advantages in its pecuniary coffers and legal expertise over Harr, Harr remains confident that he will prevail because he has justice on his side… and he is fighting for the legal rights of all ordinary individuals who have been trampled upon by the big and powerful.
Recent revelations about a 2007 IRS tax lien against Duke Lacrosse defendant Reade Seligmann just goes to confirm the obvious, as I stated long ago… the reason for keeping the financial arrangement of Duke University’s settlement with the party-going Duke Lacrosse defendants secret was because it was so outrageous. Duke University was too embarrassed for rolling over without a fight and submitting to the demands of the avaricious attorneys, and the Carpetbagger families didn’t want people to think that they threatened Duke with a law suit just for the money. It seems that the amount Duke University forked over to each of the Duke Lacrosse defendants was far greater than the figure my sources gave me of $7 million. That amount actually is closer to the amount of tax due the IRS, which the agency puts at $6.5 million. According to Raleigh tax lawyer Jack Cummings, a tax of that amount would be indicative of an income of $18 million. Another tax attorney has the estimate as $20 million… which is probably the most accurate and the figure with which I will refer.
And it was in 2007 that Duke University settled out of court with the Duke Lacrosse defendants, and it is where the vast majority of their income would be of account. That is $13.5 million after tax per Lacrosse player, and that’s not bad especially when you consider what they went through to get it. First, they attended a beer-guzzling, stripper-ogling party with under-aged drinking, shouting of racial epithets (and probably other crimes taking place), then after being charged with a sexual assault they did not spend one day in jail. They became media darlings with all the media types coddling over them and misleading the public by proclaiming that they had been “exonerated” (as was reported by Deborah Morgan of WRAL-TV-5 as recently as the night of February 24, 2011, when the story broke here.) Then books are written about the Duke Lacrosse party incident which is revisionist propaganda history at its best. And HBO has been wracking its brains trying to somehow produce a movie about the Duke Lacrosse case without showing the true colors of the Duke Lacrosse defendants. Two objective screenplays have already been written, but the head honchos discarded them and fired their authors… HBO is essentially requiring that the Duke boys be put in a positive light which is itself an impossibility if a story about the Duke Lacrosse case is to contain an iota of truth. The plan which seems to be adopted by HBO movie executives is to demand a script that does not mention the Duke Lacrosse boys and instead focuses on former Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong. (I would suggest that they consider hiring MSNBC Senior Legal Analyst Susan F. Filan. She has shown the capacity to fabricate libelous statements about Mr. Nifong and then to use those very false statements to attack his character.) Finally, universities and Wall Street bigwigs have been clamoring to bring the boys into the fold to study and work.
Now it’s not enough that each of the defendants was rewarded with $20 million for their bad behavior, but even after that, they want an additional $10 million each from the city of Durham. It is very apparent that the Carpetbaggers and their counsel thought that when the mighty Duke University toppled, that the city of Durham would follow suit and turn over the money. Somehow the cash-strapped city managed to summon up the nerve to stand and fight against the Carpetbagger juggernaut, not unlike Winston Churchill stood up against Nazi aggression. Now action on that front has been at a standstill for years, more or less. Nonetheless, Durham is still wasting taxpayer dollars to pay lawyers to go through the motions of defending the city.
The Carpetbaggers want the public to believe that they are so much in legal debt in fighting Duke University and the aftereffects of the Duke Lacrosse case, but surely they can use some of their net gain of $13.5 mil to pay their attorneys. Their stated excuse for suing the Bull City (to effect changes in the criminal justice system to the benefit of all Durhamians) is nothing more than a bunch of bull. They are suing the city because they are GREEDY.
Although Duke shelled out $60 million in an ill-advised settlement with the Carpetbaggers, they compounded that mistake by trying to force the National Union Fire Insurance Company, the university’s insurance company, to reimburse them… this, after making such an outlandish settlement without even discussing it with them. Duke is the one that breached its agreement with the insurance company, yet it filed suit in an attempt to recover the money it handed over on a platter. Just recently, Duke reached an agreement with the company, an affiliate of AIG, and per protocol terms were not disclosed. However, both parties agreed to drop claims and counterclaims against each other, and pay their own legal costs.
The Carpetbaggers need to emulate Duke University with regards to its squabble with National Union Fire Insurance Company. Instead of continuing to throw good money after bad, they need to rein in their attorneys and drop their suit against the city of Durham. They need to accept the fact that the city refused to take their bluff, as did the mighty university, unless it is the underlying goal of the Carpetbaggers to deplete the city’s coffers as a final vindictive act. But I don’t believe that is their goal… they’re in it for the money.
According to a news report last night, Duke University has approved a substantial increase in tuition… no doubt to help cover its giveaway to the Duke Lacrosse defendants and its ill-advised lawsuit against their insurance company.
Note: Click on the link below to access the latest installment (Part 9) of Episode V of “The MisAdventures of Super-Duper Cooper.”
LINK: http://justice4nifong.com/direc/sdcDirec/sdcEpv/sdc145.htm
NOTE: The blog below is rife with errors, all unintentional and the result of an attempt to get the important blog out before double checking on its accuracy. Because Shan Carter is currently incarcerated at Central Prison, communication is severely restricted to letter writing and weekly visits. In posting the blog below, I allowed my desire to get this most egregious legal system outcome before the public over waiting until it had been vetted by Shan for accuracy. One of the most blatantly false statements I made was that Kwada Temoney, Tyrone Baker, and Shan all started firing their weapons, when in fact Temoney was unarmed at that time, and Shan was the only one who fired. Another mistake had to do with dates… I stated that Shan was convicted of a capital case in the Baker/Green deaths in 1997, when, he was actually convicted in 2001. One final mistake towards the end of the blog was that I stated that the prosecution in the Brunson murder did not seek a death penalty conviction because the FBI lab was unable to link hair fiber evidence to Shan. That was incorrect, as the prosecution sought for a death penalty conviction for Shan Carter in Brunson’s death in a case without physical evidence, eyewitness evidence… Prosecutor John Sherrill sought a death penalty conviction in the Brunson murder based solely on hearsay testimony. For more a more accurate accounting on this story and errors made within this blog, go to the blog posted on December 3, 2010, titled: “Deadly 1997 confrontation between Shan Carter and Tyrone Baker.” - December 3, 2010
In 1997, the judicial system of North Carolina sentenced Shan (pronounced “Shawn”) Edward Carter to not one, but two death sentences. The year previously, in a third murder case, Carter was sentenced to a life sentence instead of death penalty number three, but only because the FBI was unable to match hair evidence from that murder case to him. The life term and capital convictions against Shan Carter would lead any reasonable person to believe that Shan is a monster of Charles Manson-esque proportions… however, that is truly not the case, as is indicated by even the most cursory examination of the facts in cases linked to Carter.
Mr. Carter, an African American male in his mid-thirties who is from a family not considered by most to be perched on the upper or middle rungs of our American societal class rankings, nicely fits into the state’s Class and Color scheme which defines him as being expendable according to North Carolina’s justice system. He is by no means a paragon of virtue and good citizenship, but by no means does he come close to being a cold blooded killer. In the mid-1990’s Shan was in his early twenties, and was a man whose drug habits involved marijuana and alcohol only. Shan dabbled in criminal acts, such as selling heroin, and committing burglary, often in conjunction with individuals of questionable character… common qualities of the company he kept in those days. And Shan did carry a gun on his person… not for use in the commission of crimes, rather for his own protection.
Why, you ask, would Shan Carter need protection? Because some drug dealers in the Wilmington area where he resided wanted to kill him. Why would drug dealers want to kill Mr. Carter? They targeted Carter because they believed that he had burglarized them (the drug dealers). Why would Carter burglarize the residences of drug dealers? Because that’s were the money and drugs were.
In November 1996, Shan, along with Kwada Temoney and Damont White burglarized the rental apartment of Tyrone Baker, a drug dealer from New York. At the time of the crime, Baker was unknown to Shan and Kwada, although Baker knew Damont White and had his confidence. In ransacking Baker’s apartment, the trio hit pay dirt when they came across forty thousand dollars ($40,000.00) stashed in a hiding place. Needless to say, Tyrone Baker was livid when he returned to find his apartment turned upside down, inside out, and his money missing. The first thing Baker did was to kidnap Lamont White, who he believed had a part in the burglary, and he then proceeded to pistol whip him into divulging the identities of White’s accomplices. Later, when Baker found Shan and Kwada Temoney near Tenth and Dawson Streets in Wilmington, Baker sucker punched Temoney sending him to the ground. All three men drew their guns, with Shan trying to aim low in an attempt to wound Baker in the leg. Temoney may have fired his weapon, as well. Shan ran after firing his weapon without knowing the outcome of his defensive response. Regardless, it wasn’t until news broadcasts aired much later that Shan learned that Demetrius Green, an eight year old boy was killed in the exchange of gunfire that took place on that corner. Carter had never seen the boy whose life was taken by a wayward bullet. It most certainly was not Carter’s intention to seek out the boy with the intent to take his life.
Weeks after the shootout involving Temoney and Carter, during the early hours of December 6, 1996, a masked Kwada Temoney, along with two others whose identities were shielded, broke into the home of Donald Brunson, a known drug dealer who was suspected of having a large amount of money hidden in his girlfriend’s home where he stayed. This home invasion of Brunson was carried out at approximately 3:00 am, according to Brunson’s girlfriend and a known victim/witness of the crime. Temoney pistol whipped Brunson in an attempt to get Brunson to give up the location of his financial cache. Brunson did not reveal the place where his money was hidden, but instead pleaded with his intruders, addressing Temoney by name. After Brunson recognized Temoney, he was taken from his girlfriend’s house by Temoney and his accomplices, and later turned up dead.
Although there was no forensic evidence or eyewitness testimony linking Shan Carter to the murder of Donald Brunson, Carter was charged as an accomplice in Brunson’s murder based solely on hearsay evidence by witnesses who lacked credibility. The prosecution made a plea deal (reminiscent of the kind made by Prosecutor Tom Ford in wrongly convicting Gregory Taylor) with Kwada Temoney which spared Temoney from the death penalty in exchange for Temoney giving testimony to implicate Shan Carter for being involved in the home invasion and the taking of Brunson’s life. Prosecutors also changed their narrative of the Donald Brunson murder stating that only two home invaders (Temoney and Shan Carter) were involved, instead of three as initially described by the victim/witness shortly after the crime took place.
In February 2, 2000, criminal defense attorney Richard Miller was appointed by the court to represent Shan Carter in the Brunson case after his predecessor William Bonney recused himself the previous month due to an apparent conflict of interest. Trial in the case against Carter was set to begin May 1, 2000, approximately three months after Miller was assigned. After accepting the case, and upon immediately noticing the lack of preparation by Carter’s former attorney, Miller, in March 2000, filed a motion asked Judge Hockenberry for a continuance for the beginning of the trial based on the following: 1) the defense had not been adequately prepared by his predecessor; 2) there had been little to no investigation done by the defense; 3) the prosecution had not turned over all discovery to the defense, and was slow to turn over discovery; and 4) Kenneth Hatcher, the attorney who had assisted Bonney initially, had no experience in handling defense in a capital case. Despite expressing to Judge Hockenberry his inability to adequately prepare to represent Carter by the trial date, the judge denied Miller’s motion to continue Carter’s trial.
During Carter’s 2000 trial for the murder of Donald Brunson, prosecutors made frequent references to the shootout involving Carter, Tyrone Baker, Kwada Temoney, during which Baker and eight year-old Demetrius Green were killed (even though the trial against Carter in this case had not yet been held and he had not been convicted of crimes in that case). Carter’s prosecutors sought help from the Federal Bureau of Investigations lab in an attempt to link Carter to the Brunson murder through mitochondrial DNA of hair specimens collected from two ski masks and a toboggan cap discovered abandoned in the victim’s car used in his kidnapping. If a physical link could be established between evidence collected and Shan Carter, prosecutors had planned to seek a death penalty conviction. However, because the FBI lab was unable to produce forensic results for which the prosecutors had prayed would help bolster a case against Carter which was totally lacking in credible evidence, and which was based solely on questionable hearsay testimony from unreliable sources, they instead opted for, and were successful in obtaining, a conviction against Carter which carried a life sentence.
The Brunson case conviction of Carter was quickly followed by the 2001 trial of Shan Carter for capital murder charges against him in the deaths of Tyrone Baker – a drug dealer, and 8 year-old Demetrius Green. In his trial, held before a jury consisting of eleven white people and one African American male, prosecutors repeatedly tied Carter to the Brunson murder (a crime which Shan Carter had always maintained his innocence and denied any involvement). Prosecutors sought a conviction against Carter by preying on the jurors’ empathy and sympathy for the death of an eight year-old boy… advising them not to allow the boy’s death to go unpunished.
Despite the fact that bullets, which might have come from Carter’s gun, struck down an armed and vengeful drug dealer and may have caused the death of an 8 year-old boy, the jury gave prosecutors what it wanted… a capital conviction against Carter for the death of Tyrone Baker (obviously a case of self-defense), and a capital conviction against Carter for the death of the boy Demetrius Green (obviously an accidental and unintentional incident). (I am still uncertain as to whether it has been scientifically established that the bullet or bullets responsible for Green’s death came from Carter’s weapon.)
The record shows that the only time Shan Carter has ever drawn and fired his gun was when he perceived this life to be in danger… in self-defense. His criminal activities were not confrontational in nature, as they mainly consisted selling heroin and of participating in burglaries of dwellings in which no one was at home. Shan never engaged in the armed robbery of a bank, or the armed robbery of an individual. Nor did he ever arm himself for the purpose of going in pursuit of an individual with the intent of taking a life.
When I visited Shan Carter in prison, it was quite sobering to see him wearing a red jumpsuit, which signifies that he is a Death Row inmate. It is such a miscarriage of justice when one considers that he was convicted in the Donald Brunson murder without any credible evidence or eyewitness testimony. The conviction of Shan Carter for Brunson’s murder relied on perjured hearsay testimony of disreputable individuals making statements which the polygraph tester interpreted as deceptive and or statements made in exchange for money. Not only that, but the state withheld from the defense exculpatory mitochondrial DNA evidence on hair samples which supported Shan’s contention that he was not even present when the kidnapping and murder of Brunson took place. The prosecution played fast and loose with discovery by withholding it and/or unacceptably delaying turning it over to the defense.
Like the two preceding Investigative Reports about MSNBC Senior Legal Analyst Susan Filan’s libelous fabrications about Mike Nifong and Duke University’s discrimination against me for openly being a supporter of Mike Nifong, a third Investigative Report will go into depth about the injustices against Shan Edward Carter by the state of North Carolina and its attempt to execute him without cause.
At tremendous expense and waste of taxpayer dollars to hold an inmate on Death Row, the state is proceeding to apply the irrevocable and most extreme punishment to Shan Carter… a man who was completely innocent of the kidnapping and murder of drug dealer Donald Brunson… a man who may have fired the bullet that killed drug dealer Tyrone Baker during an act in self-defense… and a man who has served more than a decade behind bars and may have been responsible for the accidental and inadvertent death of Demetrius Green, an 8 year-old boy who was sitting in a car when struck by a ricocheting bullet. The upcoming Investigative Report, along with future blogs, will provide extensive documentation to support the position that Shan Carter should not only be taken off Death Row, but released from prison with time served for the possible manslaughter charge related to the accidental death of Demetrius Green.
It’s like de ja vu all over again. MSNBC President Phil Griffin is again chastising his network’s television hosts by meting out suspensions. The latest victim, according to a Bloomberg News article by Ronald Grover that appeared in the November 20, 2010 edition of The News & Observer is Joe Scarborough. He was placed on a two-day time out for making scintilla-sized donations of $500 to his brother and three of his longtime friends who were involved in local political races. The article did not mention whether or not Scarborough would be docked pay for the two day suspension.
Now, it appears that what Mr. Scarborough and Mr. Keith Olbermann, who underwent a similar suspension just weeks earlier, did was to violate the MSNBC policy which requires that political contributions be cleared in advance by the network. Scarborough and Olbermann did not consult the network before doling out their miniscule campaign contributions. It is obvious that the reason for the MSNBC policy requiring that contributions be cleared is so that the network can control which politicians receive campaign contributions. If, for example, Joe Scarborough wanted to contribute to a politician whose views were not to the liking of the MSNBC bigwigs, his request would be denied. Or, if Keith Olbermann wanted to make a donation to a politician whose goals were similar and/or favorable to those of MSNBC, then he would receive the go-ahead. So, the MSNBC policy requiring that contributions be cleared in advance, is, itself, unethical and sleazy.
A contrite Mr. Scarborough was quick to accept responsibility for his misstep, which was the right thing to do… especially if he wanted to remain employed at the network. This is the kind of bullying that keeps MSNBC employees “in their place.” That is why Mr. Scarborough, Keith Olbermann, and Rachel Maddow won’t comment about MSNBC Senior Legal Analyst Susan Filan’s libelous online statement about former Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong. Let’s face it, if I were in their shoes, I probably wouldn’t either, especially if I had a family to support, a mortgage to pay, and wanted to live a luxurious lifestyle. It is never wise to bite the hand that feeds you. So, I do not fault them for choosing to look the other way when it comes to Ms. Filan’s misdeeds.
For those unfamiliar with Ms. Filan’s June 17, 2007 article in which she stated that Mike Nifong asked his son to attend his hearing before the North Carolina State Bar, and then trashed him for doing so and suggested that he used his son to gain sympathy and pity, a full Investigative Report is available on our website: www.justice4nifong.com. The problem with the June 17th article by Ms. Filan is that she fabricated the part about Mr. Nifong asking his son to attend his hearing. She just made it up out of thin air. No one gave her such information and she never viewed a recording in which Mr. Nifong made the statement. Fact of the matter is, after I spoke with Mrs. Nifong, who is privy to private Nifong household conversations, told me that Mr. Nifong specifically asked his son not to attend, but that his son insisted on doing so to show support for his embattled father. This illustrates that although it was Ms. Filan who accused Mr. Nifong of using his son for his personal gain, it was Ms. Filan who used Mr. Nifong’s son to her benefit… and her objective was to carry out a Jedi Mind-trick on the public. Her actions were sanctioned, no doubt, by the head honchos at MSNBC who were in cahoots with others in the media, the state of North Carolina, the North Carolina State Bar, the triumvirate of barristers representing the Carpetbagger families of the Duke Lacrosse players, and others conspirators to destroy Mike Nifong.
Because the media closely adheres to the Carpetbagger Jihad agenda against Nifong, it goes out of its way not to broadcast or publish articles about events which shine a positive light on Mr. Nifong, or events which cast a negative shadow on his detractors. Such is what happened at Duke University on April 14, 2010, when I attended an event on the Duke campus which was advertised as open to the public. At the conclusion of the informal interview of guest Justice Stephen Breyer, I was approached by security and asked to leave the campus. I was targeted not for anything I said or anything I did. I was kicked off campus because of my thoughts, opinions, and beliefs about Mike Nifong. In other words, I was discriminated against because I was an openly known supporter of Mike Nifong. The security guard, who was sent to oust me in this premeditated and malicious incident, had no idea why I was being evicted, and as he stated repeatedly, he was “only doing my job.” And, I believe him, but, just because I tried to ascertain from him the reason for my being escorted off campus, he repeatedly threatened me with arrest. The majority of my conversation with the security guard is on audio record along with a transcript now available on the Investigative Report section of our website.
The media has no problem covering other instances of discrimination, such as that at Raleigh’s Cameron Village Shopping Center recently, during which a security guard asked two lesbians who were showing a little public affection to leave the property. Coverage was intensive and extensive… including the incident, the apology, the meeting between the aggrieved and the employer of the security guard, and the rally which celebrated the concessions won to protect rights of gays and lesbians on Cameron Village grounds. Even CNN gave the incident heavy news air time, and an appearance on the Joy Behar show. However, I am told by a media-type that Duke’s discrimination against me (based solely upon what was contained within my cranium) is not newsworthy. It is obvious that the definition of “newsworthy” is applied by a separate set of standards when it comes to Mike Nifong… and that is not surprising, because everything having to do with Mr. Nifong (his disbarment, persecution, and denied rights) is singular.
So the ethical Mr. Griffin, who probably made political contributions which he cleared with himself, will most likely continue to do his part to keep the masses ignorant of the egregious and blatantly false writings of MSNBC Senior Legal Analyst Susan Filan, as well and the inexcusable lapses of judgment on the part of Duke University in its discriminatory actions against me. That, unfortunately, is the reality of today’s media, a place wherein there is no room for ethics.
In the November 11, 2010 sports section of The News & Observer, writer Caulton Tudor opined what everyone who follows the NFL already knows… the Carolina Panthers are terrible. Titled “Panthers are awful, and no fun to watch: Even worse, there’s not much hope for the future,” Tudor whines about how depressing it is to watch the 1-7 team which appears to be struggling mightily to win. He is especially critical of the Panthers’ quarterbacks, stating that they lack any hint of promise or improvement… and that they are unable to get the ball with an accurate throw to the team’s most exciting player Steve Smith. Mr. Tudor ranks another 1-7 team, the Dallas Cowboys, as being better than Carolina. Even winless Buffalo Bills are placed in a more enviable position than the lackluster Panthers.
Now, there is not much that I disagree with in the Tudor evaluation, including his prediction that Coach John Fox will not be able to retain his position as head coach. Although I will bet dollars to doughnuts that Tudor is equally accurate in his assessment that John Fox will not be at the team’s helm next season, that doesn’t mean I have to like it. It seems that whenever a team goes into a tailspin, the solution all too often is to release the coach. With the Carolina Panthers, it is the owners who are responsible for the dire situation in which they find themselves. First they were too quick to rid themselves of the veteran quarterback (Jake Delhomme) whose play was admittedly streaky at times, with no quarterback of substance to step in immediately and take over the position. Matt Moore and Jim Clausen may very well develop into first rate quarterbacks, but that usually requires experience to back up talent. Secondly, and more importantly, the owners of the Carolina Panthers had the opportunity to pick up, for a song, one of the best and most exciting quarterbacks in the league… Michael Vick. But they didn’t.
After Vick was released from incarceration after serving a two year sentence for his role in a dog-fighting venture, he was available to play for all of the teams in the league. Carolina could have made an offer to Mr. Vick, which I am sure he would have taken. As it was, no team showed any interest in having Michael Vick on their team. Carolina definitely did not. Philadelphia Eagles was the only team willing to give Vick any consideration, and this only after its star quarterback McNabb pleaded with the Eagles to give Vick a chance. So, it was only with reluctance that Michael Vick landed on an NFL team as a backup QB. This is hard to comprehend when one considers the talents of Vick… he has a rifle for an arm, the southpaw is accurate with his throws, he runs like a deer, and he has the ability to escape from a collapsing pocket and turn a big loss into a big gain. Talk about an exciting tandem of Vick and Steve Smith… makes your mouth water. Not only that, but Vick has been playing in the league for years, so he brought with him to Philadelphia on-the-field experience, as well a maturity that was honed in prison.
Panther owners passed on the opportunity to have Michael Vick quarterback the Carolina franchise, and now to make amends for their lack of foresight they will most likely sack their head coach, John Fox. Had the owners made the logical and intelligent decision to immediately pick up Vick the moment he was available, there is little doubt that the Panthers’ record would more likely than not be better than .500. There is no doubt that it would be better than it is currently. An attempt to obtain Vick was not a coaching decision, rather it was a ownership one, and because the ownership messed up by not at least trying to acquire Vick, it appears as though the Panthers, Coach Fox, Panther fans, and Sports commentator Caulton Tudor will suffer.
The reason the Panthers owners did not go after Vick is not a mystery. They were in cahoots with the other owners to blacklist Michael Vick. He was not supposed to be picked up by any NFL team, but the Philadelphia Eagles owner, it seems, would much rather have a chance at bringing home a championship trophy than engaging in a loosely knit cabal to put a premature end to a talented professional’s career. Not so, the Carolina Panthers owners (who needed a quality quarterback much more than Philadelphia which had Hall of Fame-bound quarterback Donovan McNabb at the time), and as a direct result, the Tar Heel state team is now suffering the consequences.
The media has kept quiet about the debacle with NFL teams not pursuing Michael Vick, especially those in need of a quality player in the game’s most important position. Mr. Tudor did not even mention the fact that Carolina passed on the opportunity to obtain Vick. And, of course, since Michael Vick landed with the Eagles, the media has consistently tried to stir up a quarterback controversy in Philadelphia... even after Vick’s spectacular play was interrupted by a rib cartilage injury. I did not buy into the media’s QB controversy hype for a minute because I knew that when Vick recovered that he would be playing… and he would be playing because the Eagles want to win more than they want to punish a man who has served his time with dignity.
As I have stated before, this same sort of blacklisting can be compared to legal events in the cash-strapped city of Durham. Another Michael, former Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong, represented the finest prosecutor, in my opinion, that the state of North Carolina will ever have the fortune to have. He had nearly three decades of prosecutorial experience under his belt when the Duke Lacrosse case fell into his lap, and he had built a reputation of being a prosecutor who was fair and who had integrity. One thing that set Mr. Nifong apart from other prosecutors is the fact that he was independent in seeing that justice prevailed. Very much like Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Beckett who defied England’s King Henry II and followed strong-held religious principles much to his detriment, District Attorney Nifong defied the wishes of the Powers-That-Be when he proceeded to prosecute the three Duke Lacrosse defendants based on statements made by an alleged sexual assault African American victim. When the defense attorneys for the Duke Lacrosse defendants filed a motion for prosecutorial discovery, Nifong’s office responded within 24 hours with approximately 1,500 pages of documents, plus CDs and DVDs. The media has never mentioned that Mr. Nifong has always maintained an open file policy when it came to sharing evidence with defense attorneys… doing so 25 years before it became mandated by law. Finally, Mr. Nifong demonstrated his dedication to the principle of acting as a “Minister of Justice” when, after later statements by the alleged accuser did not meet standard for rape, he immediately dropped those charges against the Lacrosse defendants.
The media, egged on the Carpetbagger families of the Duke Lacrosse defendants, flagrantly devoted its energies to destroy Mike Nifong. One outstanding example was the fabrication by MSNBC Legal Analyst Susan Filan that Mr. Nifong requested that his son attend his hearing. Using this false statement, she then lambasted Mr. Nifong for using his son, when she is the one, in fact, who was using Mr. Nifong’s son. Another example of media bias was the rigged Primary Poll sponsored by ABC-11 News in an attempt to establish a pitiful and diabolical motive for Mr. Nifong’s decision to prosecute the Duke boys. Another egregious act by all media was the misleading and false statements that the Duke Lacrosse defendants were exonerated, cleared, and determined to be not guilty… all based on Attorney General Roy Cooper’s April 11, 2007 “Innocent Promulgation.” Although the state persecuted Mr. Nifong, it was the media that crucified him, and turned the unwitting public against him.
In comparison of the cases of the two Michaels, the owners of the Carolina Panthers went along with the overriding consensus of the majority of other NFL owners… only at their detriment when giving up the golden opportunity to have on their roster one of the game’s most exciting and talented players. The people of Durham County, who did not rally behind their unjustly beleaguered district attorney, are the ones who suffer by not having as district attorney the man who epitomizes “equal justice for all.” Furthermore they lack the services of a prosecutor who has the courage to go it alone in truly fulfilling his role as a “Minister of Justice.” Whereas the people of North Carolina should be well aware of the blunder by the Carolina Panther owners, it may take some time before the people of Durham County realize theirs.
Phil Griffin, MSNBC President, made the decision to suspend Keith Olbermann without pay from his program on that cable station after he became aware that Olbermann had made political contributions to three Democratic campaigns last month. According to the New York Times article, Mr. Olbermann donated $2,400 to three campaigns, which evidently violated policies in place at MSNBC. In reaching his decision to act against Mr. Olbermann, Mr. Griffin consulted first with Steve Capus, President of NBC News, and Jeff Zucker, CEO of NBC-Universal. Mr. Griffin was actually quoted in an early Friday, November 5th, afternoon statement as saying, “Mindful of NBC News policy and standards, I have suspended him indefinitely without pay.”
To add fuel to the fire, Bob Steele, the Director of the Prindle Institute for Ethics at DePauw University, issued the following comment on the subject, “When a journalist becomes an activist, the principle of independence is not just eroding, it’s corroding from within.”
Donating a paltry sum to a several political campaigns pales in significance to the outlandish act of brazenly lying to the public… as Susan Filan did in an online article. Ms. Filan is the Senior Legal Analyst for MSNBC, and in an article in 2007 titled “Nifong’s punishment severe, appropriate,” she fabricates a story in which she accuses former Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong of asking his son to attend his hearing before the North Carolina State Bar. The statement is given as fact, as though she was in the Nifong living room and heard it firsthand. She compounds the libelous statement by using it to attack Mr. Nifong’s character… suggesting that he had selfish motives in “asking” his son to attend his hearing… possibly to gain pity or sympathy she conjectures.
Since I first read the article by Ms. Filan, I had doubts about its veracity as I wondered how she would be privy to such information. Surely she was not a guest in the Nifong household when the comments were made. I thought that she most likely had caught a video tape in which Mr. Nifong might have mentioned that he asked his son to attend his hearing. I didn’t know exactly how she came about her information, but because she used it as a basis to denigrate Mr. Nifong’s sensitivities and parenting skills, I thought that she had a basis for making the claim that Mr. Nifong asked his son to attend his hearing. So, I thought that I would just verify her statement by asking the Nifongs directly. I must say that I was not at all surprised to learn that the MSNBC Senior Legal Analyst statements were nothing more than a figment of her imagination. It never happened. In fact, what happened was to the contrary. Mr. Nifong asked his son not to attend the hearing, but he insisted on showing support for his embattled father… like any good son with proper upbringing would do.
MSNBC Senior Legal Analyst Filan accused Mr. Nifong of using his son and taking advantage of him, but as it is now clearly apparent, Ms. Filan is the one who took advantage of Mr. Nifong’s son. She used him to get in a flagrant below the belt jab at Mr. Nifong. The evidence is all laid out in the Investigative Reports section of the official Committee on Justice for Mike Nifong website (www.justice4nifong.com).
As was plainly pointed out in the writings in the investigative reports, including several other blogs on the topic, what is truly alarming is the unwillingness of the individuals at MSNBC to investigate themselves or take any action whatever. I wrote to Ms. Filan in December 2009, asking for any documentation or source for her statement about the alleged conversation between Mr. Nifong and his son. She refused to respond. When I wrote to Rick Cotton, the General Counsel of NBC-Universal and Jeff Zucker, the CEO of NBC-Unversal, all letters sent to them by certified mail were returned with the word “refused.” They are doing their best to protect Ms. Filan and to continue to mislead viewers who go online to read her 2007 article.
Now I don’t know if Mr. Steele would consider fabricating a story to use in order to attack someone’s character unethical, but I certainly do. In fact, I would consider it to be a far more egregious act than doling out a few bucks to the campaign coffers of a few politicians. MSNBC Senior Legal Analyst Susan Filan’s article and the reaction (or more accurately, inaction) of Mr. Cotton and Mr. Zucker to my queries about it directly bring the credibility of NBC News into question.
One thing is apparent to me, however, and that is that the mainstream media, and most media in general, have a well entrenched bias against Mr. Nifong. To them, any story that sheds any favorable light on Mr. Nifong is not “newsworthy.” They go to extremes to ignore it. Will New York Times writers Brian Stelter and Bill Carter write about Susan Filan lying to the public? I doubt it. Not because they do not want to, but that the Powers-That-Be who pay their salaries and upon whom their livelihoods depends will quash any attempt to do so. As has been pointed out in the News section of our website, Rae Evans, mother of Duke Lacrosse defendant Dave Evans, worked as an executive at CBS News for more than a decade… and of course she has strong ties with many in the news media.
Phil Griffin can levy sanctions against Keith Olbermann for a bit of trifle, but when it comes to serious matters of intentionally lying to the public as documented in the Susan Filan incident (the Senior Legal Analyst of MSNBC), you can count on him to go along with Rick Cotton and Jeff Zucker… acting like an ostrich and sticking his head in the ground… acting oblivious to the potential for great harm she’s doing to his company, and to the news media in general.
As far as suspending Mr. Olbermann indefinitely without pay, I think it was an ill-advised and petty response. Reinstate Keith Olbermann immediately. The person who is deserving of suspension and other punitive actions for fabricating stories is the person that all of the MSNBC and NBC-Universal executives are circling the wagons to protect.
Susan Filan LINK: http://justice4nifong.com/direc/irepoDirec/irDirec.htm
There are important and exciting changes and events coming soon on the Committee on Justice for Mike Nifong’s website: www.justice4nifong.com. First of all, you will notice that there will be much more in the way of audio available. It will be present on various web pages, and not limited to the Multi-media section. Audio will also be presented on videos, especially animated ones such as the second preview trailer for the upcoming educational comic strip, “The MisAdventures of Super-Duper Cooper. A link to it will be provided in this blog.
There will also be more animations and videos added to the website, as time permits. A series of previews with variations announcing the upcoming Episode V of “Super-Duper” are in the works and will be added as well. A complete collection of them will be found on You Tube.
To celebrate the upcoming New Year, Episode V will have its first installment posted online on our website on 2011’s first Sunday, January 2nd. Successive episodes will be posted each following Sunday. This comic strip episode is much larger than previous episodes… larger than the previous four combined. Not only that, but it will be more educational, and, of course, hilarious. Many familiar North Carolina celebs will be featured in cameo guest spots, especially those in the media. The strip will also feature one of this blog’s commenters in an extended role.
Since switching formats for the websites many links are not properly established, and I apologize for that. I will try to get them up and running as soon as possible.
A section of which I am extremely proud is Investigative Reports. Currently, the report about MSNBC’s Senior Legal Analyst Susan Filan’s blatantly libelous online statement is featured. These reports contain documents and other forms of evidence to support premises presented. There are two upcoming reports that are in the pipeline that you will not want to miss. One is an extended report about the discrimination against me by Duke University in April 2010. Discrimination was based solely on the fact that Duke did not approve of my beliefs and thoughts… specifically, after attending an event open to the public, I was kicked off campus because I am a supporter of justice for Mike Nifong. Instead of complying with principles of decency and restorative justice, the university tried to defend its deplorable actions. This Investigative Report will include an audio recording of between the security guard and myself (along with a transcript) that is the crux of this horrendous incident. And there are plenty of supporting documents as well that are creatively displayed on the site.
Another upcoming topic for the Investigative Report, and a case about which much of this website and blog will be devoted to is about the injustice of a man serving time in jail who was wrongly convicted of murder. He was also convicted and received the death penalty for the deaths of two other individuals… deaths which should have never been considered as premeditated or worthy of the death penalty. Deaths in those cases should have been considered as self-defense and manslaughter. It will be very apparent after viewing that Investigative Report why the Tar Heel state has earned its reputation for meting out “selective justice based on Class and Color.”
So, hang on to you i-Pad, laptop, or desktop, because we’re in for a wild ride beginning in the next couple of days.
LINK: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0VEljQPwSI
Recently, right-wing conservative Tea-bagger and blogger Andrew Breitbart unleashed a torrent of statements and activities which brought awareness to the nation as a whole the person holding a midlevel position in the United StatesDepartment of Agriculture… Shirley Sherrod. This African American woman, first vilified as a racial hate-monger by those on the right, as well as some leaders in the federal government and the head of the national organization – NAACP, was shortly thereafter transformed into near sainthood, as lies about Breitbart’s blog and its edited video were exposed to the light of day.
The misleading video, from a source the unapologetic Mr. Breitbart has refused to identify, takes comments made by Ms. Sherrod totally out of context and suggests that she denied assistance to a white farmer solely based on his race. Department of Agriculture Secretary Thomas Vilsack was quick to force Ms. Sherrod to resign, based on the perception of Ms. Sherrod that was presented by Mr. Breitbart. NAACP President Benjamin Jealous quickly denounced Ms. Sherrod, as well. This happened before the truth about Ms. Sherrod’s statements became known.
When the truth became known, retractions and apologies were issued by the USDA Secretary Vilsack, the White House, and the NAACP president.
Now, what is of importance in this event is that Mr. Vilsack, the man directly responsible for Ms. Sherrod’s ouster, then followed the principles of “Restorative Justice” (as is taught at Campbell University’s School of Law) in dealing with Ms. Sherrod. Those principles include: 1) Acknowledging a mistake (he admitted he made a mistake by acting without having all of the facts); 2) Apologizing (he apologized profusely and publicly to Ms. Sherrod); 3) Restoring her to her pre-incident status (he offered her another job in the agency); and 4) Preventing such an incident from occurring in the future (he stated that he would take time to fully investigate complaints in the future before taking any action). For his response to his mistake, I applaud Mr. Vilsack.
At the other end of the spectrum is Andrew Breitbart, who refused to apologize to Ms. Sherrod, but even denies any problem with his blog that was responsible for the furor that followed. Even Fox’s Bill O’Reilly offered a half-hearted apology to Ms. Sherrod for calling for firing early on in this story’s cycle. By and large, most individuals connected to this story and who acted prematurely based on the misleading Breitbart blog, did exhibit conscientiousness and common sense by issuing an appropriate mea culpa to victim Sherrod.
As unfortunate and despicable as the actions that were taken against Ms. Sherrod because of lies disseminated by Breitbart’s blog, the consequences she suffered pale in comparison to those suffered by the falsely accused Duke Lacrosse victim Crystal Mangum, and former Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong. First and foremost, the snippet of video featuring Ms. Sherrod, was taken out of context, whereas the lies about Ms. Mangum and Mr. Nifong were total fabrications. Many lies have been presented by the media and the state against Ms. Mangum, including the unsubstantiated claim that she attempted to murder her ex-boyfriend. This lie was the basis for justifying the extremely high bail of $1 million, set by Magistrate B. Wakil. Although she was charged with the attempted first degree murder charge at arrest, the charge was never sought before the grand jury because Prosecutor Angela Garcia-Lamarca knew that the charge was bogus beyond belief. What is so insidious is that the Durham Police Department trumped up the charge of first-degree arson and used it for the purpose of forcing Ms. Mangum to serve a lengthy prison sentence. To add icing to the cake, the prosecution also trumped up vandalism charges against Ms. Mangum, accusing her of damaging the windshield and tires of her ex-boyfriend’s car. The media, for the most part, has ignored this accusation, more likely than not because they doubt its credibility. The state and media should follow the lead of USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack in the Sherrod affair, and immediately act in accordance with the principles of Restorative Justice in its dealings with Ms. Mangum.
With respect to Mike Nifong, many lies have been fabricated and disseminated by the state and media, but I will focus on one of the most blatant examples – the statement by MSNBC Senior Legal Analyst Susan F. Filan in an online article titled “Nifong punishment extreme, appropriate.” In that article, Ms. Filan stated that Mr. Nifong asked his son to attend his disciplinary hearing before the State Bar in order to garner sympathy. She then berates Mr. Nifong for using his son, and being an insensitive and selfish parent. The only problem with this scenario is that it is totally fabricated… a figment of Ms. Filan’s imagination.
What is even more disturbing is that the head honchos at NBC-Universal refuse to acknowledge the falsity of Ms. Filan’s statement… thereby supporting the false and misleading statements that impugn Mr. Nifong’s character and expose him to unwarranted public scorn. Rick Cotton, Executive Vice president and General Counsel, and Jeff Zucker, President and CEO, have both refused to accept certified correspondence questioning the accuracy of Ms. Filan’s article.
Ms. Filan and MSNBC need to take up Restorative Justice principles with respect to Mr. Nifong. He is not the only one to whom they owe such a response, as they purposely duped their subscribers and viewers. Furthermore, it is advisable for them to rectify the erroneous article by Ms. Filan in order to help re-establish their own credibility. For them not to take such steps only reinforces their position as being biased against Mike Nifong.
An extensive report is now available on our official website. A link will be provided to the directory of the newly established “Investigative Reports” page. Click on the only button currently with a report, and it will bring up the story. The report shows all documents in my possession that are related to the false statement made by Ms. Filan and the refusal be NBC-Universal big-wigs to take responsible and corrective actions.
LINK: http://justice4nifong.com/profiles/irDirec.htm
According to the May 24, 2010 posted article by writers Joseph Mallia and Melanie Lefkowitz of Newsday titled “Collin Finnerty, once falsely accused, graduates college,” Cy Gurney (wife of former Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong) when she was told Newsday was calling about Collin Finnerty's graduation and homecoming, said, "I think that's wonderful. I can't speak for my husband, and I wasn't involved in the case, but I think that sounds like a great story. I believe that people should go forward.” This statement is typical and representative of the class, grace and style that the Nifongs have displayed throughout the horrific assault against them by the state of North Carolina and the biased mainstream media. Mike Nifong’s refusal to speak with meida is understandable when one takes into consideration the media assassination of him by media journalists and tv news producers. The launch of oppressive and spiteful attacks against Mr. Nifong was borne from Rae Evans’s (mother of Duke Lacrosse defendant Dave Evans) Carpetbagger Jihad call for action during a CBS “60 Minutes” television interview. Ms. Evans, in lashing out against the prosecutor who dared to bring charges against her son and two other Dukies, promised that Mr. Nifong would “pay, every day, for the rest of his life.”
Ms. Evans, who worked for more than a decade as an executive for CBS News (a fact which CBS has chosen not to disclose), is now founder and owner of a thriving Washington, D.C. consulting firm, and consequently she has the political and media connections to propel the unwarranted onslaught against a man who merely had the courage to do what was right. That man, Mike Nifong, did what he felt was the right thing to do when the alleged victim of a Duke lacrosse Spring Break beer-guzzling stripper party accused three Duke players of sexually assaulting her in March 2006. Mr. Nifong’s decision to move forward with the prosecution flew in the face of the wishes of Duke University, the North Carolina attorney general, and Governor Mike Easley. And, contrary to the rigged May 1, 2006 primary poll by SurveyUSA which was sponsored by WTVD ABC-11 News, Nifong’s pursuit of the Duke defendants severely compromised his chances of being elected to his incumbent position of Durham district attorney.
Make no mistake about it, the media is no friend of Mr. Nifong… it’s his worst nightmare. It has persistently played a Jedi mind-trick on the public with its false and misleading representations, such as the following: (1) stating that the Duke Lacrosse defendants were “exonerated”; (2) headlines falsely stating that Mr. Nifong “admitted that nothing happened”; and (3) fabricating statements, a specific example being an article by MSNBC Senior legal analyst Susan F. Filan which fictionalizes a conversation wherein Mr. Nifong asks his son to attend his disciplinary hearing.
The biased media was successful in its underhanded undertaking to destroy Mr. Nifong’s image and reputation nationwide, heaping scorn upon him and turning him into a virtual pariah. The majority of people who are aware of his unjust persecution are unwilling to show him any support for fear of being targeted themselves… the one exception being members of the Committee on Justice for Mike Nifong. This grass roots organization of supporters, formed in June 2008,has been largely ignored by the media which aims to minimize any show of support for the former embattled district attorney. Because of the anti-Nifong propaganda spewed forth by the media, many sppon-fed media subscribers have developed a visceral hatred for this honorable, gentle, decent man of integrity… Mike Nifong. So it should not come as any surprise that Mr. Nifong now refuses to talk to the media.
What I find truly disturbing is that Newsday would have the audacity to phone Mr. Nifong in order to get his opinion about Duke Lacrosse defendant Collin Finnerty’s graduation from college. Was the Newsday attempt to interview Mr. Nifong done intentionally to provoke, embarrass, rub in, flaunt, inflict emotional distress, taunt, or all of the above? I do not know what the motivation was for Newsday calling Mr. Nifong, but I know that it was uncalled for, insensitive, malicious, and demonstrated that Newsday has no class.
If Newsday wants to conduct an interview on a topic related to the Duke Lacrosse case, I would be more than happy to oblige. Instead of talking about the graduation of one of the Duke Lacrosse defendants, I would suggest the subject of Crystal Mangum’s recent incarceration on trumped up charges and her excessive $1 million bail. Newsday doesn’t want to tackle the outrageousness of this fiasco, however. Trumped up charges against Ms. Mangum included: (1) felony attempted first degree murder; (2) assault and battery; and (3) felony identity theft. These charges were included at arrest for the purpose of helping to justify the ridiculously high bail of $1 million, but they were not sought on the grand jury indictment because prosecutors knew these charges were frivolous and totally lacking in merit. The charges upon which Crystal Mangum was indicted by the grand jury were just as phony: (1) felony first degree arson (initially five counts reduced to one count at indictment) in a case where Ms. Mangum obviously executed a controlled burn and there was no flame damage or intention to damage her apartment building by fire. This charge is bogus because first degree arson by definition requires the deliberate burning of an occupied building or structure; (2) three counts of contributing to the delinquency of a juvenile are dependent on the first degree arson charge being valid, which it isn’t… therefore these three counts are baseless, as well; (3) injury to personal property – there was no proof that the few clothes burned in the bathtub had a value of $200 or more, and the claims of vandalism to the car of the ex-boyfriend brings the credibility of the Durham police reports into question; and (4) obstructing the investigation of a public officer by claiming Ms. Mangum’s giving a false name to police officers is ludicrous because they knew Ms. Mangum’s true identity before asking her.
The overriding issue is that Ms. Mangum, like Mike Nifong, DNA lab director Brian Meehan, two chief investigators of the Durham Police Department, the Durham City Manager, Nifong supporters as myself, and others considered by the Powers-That-Be to be on the “wrong end” of the Duke Lacrosse case, have been victimized by the Carpetbagger Jihadist movement. Unfortunately the media has served as a pivotal cog in the ‘Bagger’s machinery of destructive retaliation against anything pro-Nifong. By so doing, the media serves the interests of the few, well-heeled privileged at the expense of the vast majority of common folk who seek from the media honest, unbiased, and objective reporting.
The article about Duke defendant Finnerty’s graduation may be accurate in its account, but the actions by its authors to secure an interview with Mike Nifong clearly shows that Newsday is no class act.
An interesting article by Anne Blythe appeared in the March 2, 2010 edition of the News & Observer titled, “Media protest call for reports on Carson case.” It states how media companies across the state of North Carolina are fighting attempts by federal defense attorneys to have media outlets in North Carolina hand over copies of everything published about the Eve Carson homicide case. The defense contends that media in the state have saturated the public with such adverse publicity against Carson’s accused killer, Demario Atwater, that it would be impossible for him to get a fair trial within the state. They are seeking to have the federal capital murder trial held in the neighboring state of Virginia.
Sixty news organizations have been subpoenaed by the defense to produce copies of all related newspaper articles, letters and editorials, and copies of TV and radio broadcasts. In response to the request, news organizations teamed up to quash the subpoena. Raleigh attorney Amanda Martin, representing the News & Observer argues that it would be unduly burdensome and expensive to comply, despite the fact that a man is facing a death penalty if convicted. Obviously, the media’s convenience and bottom line are more important than whether or not a man, who is fighting for his life, has the benefit of a fair trial.
What makes this issue so pitifully hypocritical is the fact that many media sources, such as the News & Observer, frequently use the subpoena to obtain information that North Carolina state agencies arbitrarily withhold (against the law) in order to stonewall a media investigation. Now that the shoe is on the other foot, how does the media respond when they are subpoenaed by the defense in a capital murder case? They whine about the inconvenience of a reduced staff and hardships in the current economic times… and they do so to stonewall Atwater’s defense team in the federal case. But, that is not the overriding reason. In my opinion, the media are trying to dispel any notion that their reporting on the Carson case was in any way, shape, or form, biased. But it was.
For example the media constantly showed images from the ATM camera depicting the defendants withdrawing cash, allegedly using Eve Carson’s bank card. Evidence against the defendants in the Carson case is repeatedly played across television screens throughout the state. This is a prime example of the prosecution trying a case in the media. Only this time, they’re being called on it by competent federal defenders. Although former Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong was accused of trying the Duke Lacrosse case in the media, the fact is that he did not. To call unidentified perpetrators in an alleged gang-like sexual assault “hooligans” is a far cry from trying the case in the media. Fact is, that Mr. Nifong never presented his case before the media, a trial was never held, and the public is, therefore, unaware of the evidence supporting the prosecution’s case against the defendants. It was the defense teams in the Duke Lacrosse case that held press conferences to release lab results, to display photographs taken at the Duke Lacrosse party, and to present other information favorable to their clients. However, the media has steadfastly represented Mr. Nifong as being the one trying his case in the court of public opinion… not the Duke Lacrosse defense team.
Of course, the media in North Carolina has been biased in its reporting on the Carson case, and a change of venue should be granted to assure that justice is served. A change of venue was not granted by Wilson Judge Milton Fitch in the case of James Arthur Johnson. Although Johnson’s attorneys filed a motion to have the case moved from the city of Wilson (racially divided due to the irresponsible actions of the local law enforcement, prosecutors, and media), it was denied by Fitch without explanation. This unreasonable action by the judge was an obvious harbinger of things to come, and most likely prompted defendant Johnson to accept an Alford plea for the charge of misprision of felony (not reporting knowledge of a crime… although he did, but his three day delay in doing so was not fast enough).
Nowhere is media bias more blatant than in the attacks against Mike Nifong, and they began in the early stages of the Duke Lacrosse case. WTVD ABC-11 News was instrumental in laying groundwork for a so-called motive for Mr. Nifong’s prosecution of the Duke Lacrosse case… the ridiculous claim that he pursued the prosecution for political gain in order to win the election for Durham district attorney. The rigged poll they used stated that Nifong was in a virtual tie with Freda Black, and that a large black turnout favored Mr. Nifong. It failed to mention that blacks represented only 38% of the registered voters and that whites represented 56 % of registered voters for that primary. It defies credulity to entertain the belief that Mr. Nifong would prosecute a case that was extremely unpopular in order to win a primary race. Yet, the media put it out there, and Mr. Nifong’s detractors used it.
One of the biggest Jedi mind-tricks played on the public by the media, however, has to do with their embracing the April 11, 2007 “Innocent Promulgation” by Attorney General Roy Cooper. They universally used it as a basis to proclaim the three Duke defendants as “innocent,” “falsely accused,” “wrongly accused,” “not guilty,” “exonerated,” “cleared of criminal charges,” etc. However, the use of these adjectives to describe the Duke Lacrosse defendants is legally, technically, and factually wrong! The attorney general does not have the legal authority to make such pronouncements of “guilt,” “non-guilt,” or “innocence.” Gregory F. Taylor, who was found not guilty by a three judge panel referred by the state’s Innocence Inquiry Commission, is, on the other hand, “innocent,” or “not guilty,” and terms such as “exonerated” and “cleared” are appropriate and applicable.
MSNBC’s senior legal analyst Susan Filan has fabricated a statement about Mr. Nifong, and CBS has written headlines that falsely put words in Mr. Nifong’s mouth. Just a few of the more egregious examples of biased reporting by North Carolina media.
At least Demario Atwater is getting what appears to be competent representation by his defense attorneys in his federal case. That cannot be said about the representation Mr. Nifong received before the North Carolina State Bar. Unfair media bias against Mr. Nifong should have been brought to the fore in his defense against the trumped up ethics charges. His attorneys (David Freedman and Dudley Witt from Winston-Salem) seemed more dedicated to appeasing the unregulated North Carolina State Bar and the media than presenting an aggressive no-holds-barred defense of their unjustly disparaged client.
Susan F. Filan, senior legal analyst for MSNBC TV, authored an online editorial in mid-June 2007, titled: "Nifong's punishment is extreme, appropriate." Although opinion pieces have a bit more leeway than news articles, they should at least consist of facts, statements should be substantiated within the text, and there should be a modicum of objectivity. In fact, the entire article is misleading, inaccurate, and flagrantly biased, beginning with her initial premise that disbarment of a lawyer is as rare as a "unicorn sighting." Nothing could be further from the truth. Since its inception in 1933, the North Carolina State Bar has disbarred thousands of attorneys. According to their own web page posted in the past, approximately 350 attorneys were disbarred during a ten year period, an average of nearly three a month. This blatantly false statement is made for the purpose of making former Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong's disbarment reflect more harshly on his actions in the Duke Lacrosse case.
Had Ms. Filan stated that disbarment of prosecutors is as rare as "unicorn sightings," then that would be right on. During its 76 years in existence, the North Carolina State Bar has only disbarred one prosecutor... Mike Nifong. This, despite the fact that North Carolina lags just behind Illinois and Louisiana in the number of death row inmates who have been exonerated. Many of them, such as Alan Gell, were convicted due to prosecutorial misconduct by their prosecutor (in this particular case, David Hoke, who is now serving as assistant director of the North Carolina Administrative Office of the Courts). However the state, the Duke Lacrosse defense attorneys, and the media, including Ms. Filan, purposely keep the fact that Mr. Nifong is the only prosecutor to be disbarred hidden from the public. That is what makes his treatment so selective, also when you adopt our view which is that Mr. Nifong did nothing wrong in pursuing prosecution in the Duke Lacrosse case.
Ms. Filan presumptuously states that Mr. Nifong will not receive his pension and not be able to retire, which is exactly what he is doing. And, he is not starting "from scratch" as Ms. Filan again falsely predicted. The article by Ms. Filan is filled with a lot of baseless speculation (or "bs"), and misleading and false statements. Most outrageous is the accusation that Mr. Nifong used the Duke case to get re-elected. What information does she have to base this upon? The only television ad I recall appearing during the campaign season which used the Duke Lacrosse case for his/her advantage was run by Attorney General Roy Cooper... "The Duke Lacrosse Decision." In prosecuting the Duke Lacrosse case, Mr. Nifong was merely doing his job. By suggest that performing his duties as district attorney while running for re-election is a conflict of interest is absurd. Does she expect Mr. Nifong to remain idle until the election returns are in? F. Lane Williamson of the State Bar also buy into this ridiculous belief, which they both know to be false. These statements are made purely to mold the impressionable minds of the lay public.
Ms. Filan really gets in the gutter when she accuses Mr. Nifong of using his son as a ploy to gain sympathy, leniency, and pity. I seen nothing wrong with a knowledgeable older teenage son wanting to show support for his father by attending his hearing. What I find reprehensible is Ms. Filan's attempt to spin this positive family gesture into something sinister. It is Ms. Filan, not Mr. Nifong, who is guilty of taking advantage of Mr. Nifong's son by needlessly bringing it up in her article in order to get in yet another cheap shot at Mike Nifong. Ms. Filan's actions here are truly shameful, and unbefitting a respectable news outlet.
One of the most ludicrous accusations penned by Ms. Filan is that Mr. Nifong damaged the reputation of Duke University. I would like to know how? She also insinuates that he damaged the reputation of the sport of lacrosse? Again, how?
I don't have a law degree, but I did take a civics class in high school, and I learned about the three different branches of government: executive, legislative, and judicial. An attorney general, who belongs to he executive branch, cannot make a judicial pronouncement. Yet the media and Ms. Filan give Roy Cooper's "innocent" proclamation the validity as that coming from a judge or jury. This is wrong, period! She also claims that Mr. Nifong damaged the lives of three "innocent" young men. How? They never spent one day in jail, they each received $7 million from Duke University in an out-of-court settlement for reasons unbeknownst to me, they are heroically depicted in books, there is an upcoming HBO movie about these wonderful lads, and individually, Collin Finnerty's celebrity moved a judge to expunge an assault charge from his record. Furthermore, they have all continued on with their lives, one graduating, the other two being offered reinstatement at Duke but deciding to enroll in other prestigious institutes of higher learning with lacrosse teams. Also, the families of these boys are currently seeking an additional $10 million from the cash-strapped city of Durham (which has already spent well more than a million dollars to defend). In the annals of North Carolina jurisprudence, there are many far more compelling instances of truly innocent people whose live have been severely damaged, and by and large, they are the disenfranchised, poor, and/or people of color.
One of the most outrageous statements made by Ms. Filan suggests that Mr. Nifong, in prosecuting the Duke Lacrosse case, damaged the public's confidence in the criminal justice system (of North Carolina). Ms. Filan fails to place blame for the public's sour perception of the criminal justice system where it is due... not on Mike Nifong, but on actions of Prosecutors Hoke, Graves, Honeycutt, Brewer, Parker, Wolfe, Keith, Ford, Black, Hardin, McFadyen and a multitude of others. Hoke and Graves won a conviction by withholding exculpatory evidence which resulted in an innocent man being convicted of capital murder and spending more than nine years in jail. Bill Wolfe charged the teenager James Arthur Johnson who solved the Brittany Willis murder, rape, kidnapping, and armed robbery with those crimes based solely on the word of the killer, who implicated Johnson only after investigators told him that Johnson "snitched" on him. After the killer recanted, Wolfe brought forward two "eyewitnesses," both with connections to the police department. These witnesses disappeared when media scrutiny became a factor. Johnson served 39 months in jail without a trial before charges were finally dropped by a special prosecutor. Michael Parker charged mentally retarded Floyd Brown with murder based on a confession which experts said Brown could not possibly made. Brown was held for fourteen years without a trial for the murder, and charges were reluctantly dismissed. Prosecutor Tom Ford tried to force Gregory Taylor to falsely implicate a black suspect for a murder. Ford threatened Taylor that if he did not cooperate, then he would charge Taylor with the crime (which is what he did). Without cause and no physical evidence linking Gregory Taylor to the crime, Ford won a conviction against him based on solely on the testimony of a jailhouse snitch and a prostitute. Their testimony was given in exchange for a decrease in their jail sentence, a fact which the prosecutor willfully withheld from Taylor's defense attorney. Prosecutors were so incensed with Theodore Jerry Williams for complaining about the District Attorney, that correction guards beat him up while in custody, his face pulverized and arm broken. They then charged Williams with assaulting a guard. When the case was dismissed because the prosecution destroyed material evidence that the defendant had requested, Attorney General Roy Cooper appealed. These are only a few of the cases that shed a disfavorable light on the North Carolina justice system. Not Mr. Nifong's actions in the Duke Lacrosse case.
Mr. Nifong's actions in prosecuting the Duke Lacrosse case were well within the acceptable standards practiced by other prosecutors. He did not withhold evidence, as the defense attorneys had all DNA lab evidence no later than October 27, 2006, at a time when a court date had yet to be set. In addition, the DNA evidence Mr. Nifong is accused of "withholding" was not exculpatory, as the defense attorneys and media would have the public believe. Mr. Nifong did not lie to the court when he stated that "this is the first that I have heard of this situation." He was without a doubt referring to the first he had heard that the defense attorneys had accused him of withholding evidence. Chairman of the Disciplinary Hearing Commission F. Lane Williamson is no mind reader, and a reasonable person would not accept his interpretation of Mr. Nifong's statement over Nifong's own interpretation. The statement itself was not material and should never have been given the attention it was given, however, the State Bar was so desperate to find a reason to disbar Mr. Nifong that they grasped at all straws. Finally, pre-trial statements made by Mr. Nifong were benign, made prior to indictments being handed down, and were intended to encourage witnesses to come forward. The majority of pre-trial statements made to the media were done so by the attorneys of the Duke Lacrosse defendants, yet Ms. Filan wants to accuse Mr. Nifong of going "Hollywood" and trying the case in the press.
If Mr. Nifong was guilty of any wrongdoing in his prosecution of the Duke Lacrosse case you could not tell by reading Ms. Filan's article. Never once did she explain what he did that was deserving of disbarment. She is not alone, because law professors at Duke University School of Law are unable to explain why Mr. Nifong was disbarred. I asked more than two dozen of them, and they were even afraid to discuss what has become a taboo topic. Taboo because the attorneys, and individuals with a knowledge and understanding of the issues surrounding Mr. Nifong's disbarment, know that the actions by the North Carolina State Bar are selective and unjust. Had the Bar's disbarment of Mr. Nifong been justified, attorneys and law school professors would not be hesitant to enter into dialogue about it.
I have no problem with opinion pieces that are accurate and based on facts, however I take umbrage when such statements are based on lies, rumor, unsubstiated pronouncements, and baseless speculation. In her article "Nifong's punishment is extreme, appropriate," MSNBC Senior legal analyst Susan Filan not only does a disservice to her professions in the legal and media arenas, but an even greater disservice to the impressionable media consuming public. The article is a disgrace.
That said, I believe in fair play, and I would like to offer Ms. Filan the opportunity to respond on our blog site (www.justice4nifong.blogspot.com), our website (www.justice4nifong.com), or in any other venue or forum over which the Committee on Justice for Mike Nifong has control. Any response would be published in its entirety without editing or direct rebuttal. Shortly after the posting of this blog, I will send by postal mail an invitation to Ms. Filan asking for a reply not only to issues covered in her article and this blog, but on any other related or unrelated subjects upon which she may wish to expound.
