Oh, dear–more from reader Beth, who thinks our coverage of the two Duke lacrosse team members charged with raping a stripper on March 14 isn’t fair (click here for links).
Beth has sent not one but two e-mails. The first links to this site: http://wizbangblog.com/. There, says Beth, I’ll find a report that news outlets couldn’t see any signs of bruises on the stripper in the time-dated student-taken photos of her as she danced at the lacrosse-team party house before her alleged rape in the bathroom. (Tell that to ABC). Strange–I clicked onto the Wizbang! blog and couldn’t find a single post on the Duke rape charges–although I did find plenty on “Leaky” Mary McCarthy, late of the CIA.
And here’s e-mail #2 from Beth:
“IWF wrote: ‘Now to the legal part of the case. There are stories that the person who made the 911 call complaining of racial harassment outside the house was the second stripper at the party. The problem is that on the 911 call she identified herself as a “passer-by”. “That’s a huge, huge, hurdle for the prosecution to overcome.’
“Huh??? Have you no sense of logic whatsoever??? What another person said to 911 has no bearing whatsoever on whether or not the alleged victim was telling the truth. She did not make that call and had no control over what someone else might say on the phone. It has no bearing whatsever on the prosecution of a rape occurring inside the home. Calling this a huge huge hurdle for the prosecution is one of the most ludicrous, illogical things I have ever read. You guys must be really accustomed to having no one read or respond to you who doesn’t buy into your biased, classist, racist views. And yes I’m a highly educated middle to upper middle class white woman. I cannot believe you people.”
Sure, the fact that the other stripper, Kim Roberts, lied to the police, has an embezzlement conviction, changed her story about the Duke party a couple of times, and is trying to peddle her information for money, has no bearing whatsoever on the credibility of the alleged victim. But it sure does bear on the credibility of Roberts herself–and Roberts is currently the prosecution’s start witness.
And as a staunch defender from the word go of Kobe Bryant in his own rape case, I must say that charges of being “racist” and “classist” (whatever that means) don’t sit well with me.
So I’ll close with this Townhall column by Thomas Sowell (hat tip: La Shawn Barber), noting that Durham County, N.C., District Attorney Mike Nifong, lacking any forensic evidence against the accused, seems to be now trying something akin to extortion:
“Even beyond this case, we are increasingly becoming a society in which some people are allowed to impose high costs on other people at little or no cost to themselves. This sets the stage for extortion, not only of money but also of legal plea-bargains extorted by ambitious prosecutors.
“The stripper, for example, does not even pay the price of having her name known, while the names and pictures of the accused young men are all over the media. Even if they are acquitted, or the charges thrown out of court, this case will follow them and they will be under a cloud for the rest of their lives.
“Mr. Nifong has said that he has a third person whom he may indict. If so, he has already demonstrated to that third person what he can do by disgracing the other two and putting a heavy financial burden on their families for bail and lawyers. If that third person cannot stand the disgrace or his family cannot afford the expense, that is leverage for getting him to say whatever the prosecutor wants him to say.”
The grandstanding Nifong is up for re-election on May 2. He doesn’t deserve to win.