This morning, the News and Observer and Herald Sun both have stories providing new details about the confusing, contradictory timeline of the 911 calls on the night of the alleged Duke lacrosse rape.
Here's the N&O:
When police visited a house near Duke University on March 14 to investigate a 911 call about racial slurs, they found the house -- where neighbors had witnessed a rowdy party earlier in the evening -- completely quiet.
The 911 call came about 30 minutes before a second 911 call led police to a woman who told them she had been sexually assaulted at that same residence, at 610 N. Buchanan Blvd., during a party held that night by members of the Duke men's lacrosse team. The house had been leased to three of the lacrosse players, and 46 team members have since been ordered to submit to DNA testing. Those test results are expected next week...Police said they don't know who made the 911 call to report the racial slurs, and the complainant was gone when police arrived at the house. But Durham police spokeswoman Kammie Michael said Thursday that they are convinced the call was not made by the same woman who later said she was raped and sodomized by three men at the party.Police released new details Thursday on what they found when responding to that first call:A woman called police at 12:53 the morning of March 14 to report that a white man at 610 N. Buchanan Blvd. yelled a racial slur at her and a black friend as they passed the house.Two officers, who were patrolling in the area, arrived at 12:55 a.m. and spent 11 minutes looking for the woman who called in the complaint, Michael said. The officers knocked on the door of the house, but there was no answer. They looked in the windows and walked through the yard and alley beside the house, Michael said.They saw cups, beer cans and beer kegs. Officers spoke to a neighbor, who said there had been a party. A check of the neighborhood didn't lead to the woman who called 911, and Michael said the caller's information -- name, phone number or address -- did not appear on the dispatcher's computer when the call came in.A lawyer representing one of the players raised suspicion about the two 911 calls, saying they were "mighty coincidental."Durham lawyer James "Butch" Williams said he thinks the woman who initially called 911 to report the use of racial slurs also is involved in the rape investigation. He wouldn't go so far as to call the allegations "false reports," but he said it was suspicious that the caller knew the numbers to the house near where the slurs were shouted, though the house number is not easily seen from the street.
And here's the Herald Sun:
Two Durham police officers were investigating a reported disturbance at a Duke lacrosse party just 16 minutes before the alleged victim of a gang-rape there showed up at a grocery store more than 2 miles away to call for help.
But police found nothing at the scene, a police spokeswoman said...
Police arrived at 610 N. Buchanan Blvd. just two minutes after a woman called 911 to report she and her black friend had been verbally accosted by men outside the house yelling a racial slur early on March 14, according to computer dispatch records.
"Officers responded to the call at 610 N. Buchanan within a minute of the dispatch. The complainant was not on the scene and no one seemed to be at the house, according to the officers, so they cleared the scene after checking the area for several minutes," said police spokeswoman Kammie Michael.
The dispatch records show officers were on the scene for more than 11 minutes.
"Where are all these white guys raising hell?" asked an incredulous James D. "Butch" Williams, who represents a lacrosse captain who lived at the house and voluntarily submitted to a DNA test shortly after one of two exotic dancers hired to entertain at the party said she was raped, sodomized and beaten by three white men there. "When the people start digging the least little bit, they're gong to find out things don't make sense."
...Williams questioned the strength of the evidence. He implied Thursday that the 911 calls might have been a scam and that the entire incident was staged.
In her call reporting the racial slur, the unidentified woman offered different versions of the incident. She variously said she had driven by the house, had walked by the house and was sitting in front of the house at the time she was talking to the 911 dispatcher. She initially said one male near the Duke wall hurled the racial epithet, and later said a group of people came out of 610 N. Buchanan yelling at her and her friend. The wall and the house are on opposite sides of a dimly lit street.
"There are a number of discrepancies that point toward a contrived situation -- maybe," said Williams.
The attorney said he didn't know why anyone might perpetrate such a potential hoax.
"I can't speak to speculation," he added. "But once you tell one lie, you've got to tell another and another and another. You're caught up in a web of lies."
According to official police logs obtained by The Herald-Sun, the first 911 call was received at 12:53. a.m. on March 14, and the first officer arrived at 610 N. Buchanan at 12:55 a.m. A second unit responded, and both departed by 1:06 a.m.
The second 911 call, from the Kroger store on Hillsborough Road, initially was dispatched as an intoxicated person but later was changed to a rape case allegedly involving those at the lacrosse party. The call was placed at 1:22 a.m., 27 minutes after the police arrived to investigate the first 911 call and 16 minutes after they left the scene. The Kroger store is 2.3 miles from 610 N. Buchanan.
The second caller later told police that she had found the victim walking on North Buchanan and then drove her to the store to get help.
Williams, who has a private investigator working on the case, noted that the Police Department is closer -- nine-tenths of a mile away -- than the Kroger store and wondered why the victim would have been driven to a grocery store farther away.
Michael, the police spokeswoman, was quoted in a published report saying the woman who drove to the Kroger store was the second exotic dancer hired by the lacrosse players. Earlier Michael told The Herald-Sun the driver was not the second dancer.
Again, these may be the sort of inconsistencies that arise in any investigation based on eyewitness testimony, but why was the house dark and quiet at 12:55? Where was the dancer?
Please allow me to offer another non-racial example of why a premature rush to judgment in the media on rape cases is unjust and prejudicial to those accused. In 1980 a white woman reported to police in Brockton, Massachusetts, that she had attended a party at the chapter house of a notorious motor cycle gang known as the "East Coast Mother F...ers", where she claimed she had been held captive and gang raped for three days. I was employed at the time by the DA as a summer law student/intern. Based upon the woman's sworn statements warrants were immediately obtained for the arrest of more than 10 very colorful gang members who were dragged before a judge and arraigned in chains. It made sensational news. It proved to be an embarrassment. Subsequently the alleged victim's medical reports came back negative for evidence of physical abuse. Confronted with these reports, she confessed to concocting the entire gang-rape story to cover her failure to meet her sailor fiance' to get married.
As for the power of racial slurs to promote hysteria, retribution, and violence, in 1975 while a student at an Ivy League university (and where I had been a member of the ice hockey team - and previously graduated from an elite NE prep school), I had a summer job as a Teamster delivering beer around the Metropolitan Boston area. Sometimes I had to deliver in Roxbury and Mattapan which were overwhelmingly black neighborhoods. While making a delivery anywhere it was not unusual to be accosted by pedestrians (black and white) asking for free samples, or have to protect the truck from drive-by thieves. While doing a delivery in a tough Mattapan neighborhood I was approached by a black man requesting a free sample- a request I politely declined, standard company policy. Not long thereafter a car pulled up with four black men who got out and surrounded me. The largest, while repeatedly spewing language characterizing me as a "honkey" homosexual who engaged in sexual relations with his mother, screamed and accused me of calling his friend a "N....r", the heart of his grievance. He repeatedly informed me he was going to knock my head off. This "friend" was nowhere in sight, and the four of them would not listen to my polite denials of having done any such thing, and my requests that they let me finish my job and leave. Frankly, I thought I was going to die. The largest man attempted to follow through on his threat with a round-house swing at my face, and I fought off what became their collective attack with my hand-cart and made it into the package store without serious injury. The proprietor had already called the police, pulled out a shot gun, and was pointing it at the door from behind the counter. By the time the Boston tactical police squad had shown up in riot gear, a large crowd of angry black people had gathered. The crowd had been been whipped into a frenzy by the false story that I had called my attackers the "N" word, and then assaulted one of them (who was making a great show of suffering, playing to the crowd, while lying on the sidewalk). I could hear shouts, protests, and appeals outside that this was their neighborhood and I should be killed for having used this offensive word. The police didn't buy my attackers' stories, and they escorted my truck ( about fifty cases lighter) out of the neighborhood to safety.
In today's environment of political correctness, were I to have become involved in the same incident, I think it safe to say the police would risk censure and job termination for failure to give a presumption of credence to black victims' reports of hate language and assault claims. The newspaper headlines would probably read: "Ivy League Athlete/Prepster Arrested for Provoking Riot by Racial Epithets", and plenty of willing witnesses could be found to back the false story sufficiently for a newspaper to avoid a liable law suit. I could easily be charged with 1-st assault with a deadly weapon (the hand-cart), a felony. Whatever the outcome, my reputation would be irredeemably destroyed and the newspaper with the most sensational account would enjoy increased profit from sales. I would be completely innocent, but my life ruined because of the politics of our time.
I obviously have empathy for the Duke lacrosse players. The New York Times and other media have sought statements from fellow students suggesting that their "clubishness", and "aggressiveness", support the charges, and the neighbor's statements alleging bigoted remarks, amount to an attempt to convict these kids in public opinion. It certainly plays to stereotypes and prejudices. Law enforcement is not suppossed to disseminate information concerning pending investigations, so readers should consider the degree to which politics is driving this media circus. Lastly, the media have acted like escort service companies employ debutantes when, in fact, these agencies frequently are covers for prostitution rings. While sexual trauma may not be a job hazard for exotic dancers, it certainly is for prostitutes. While ripping these kids as privileged, the media reports the medical conclusions consistent with a rape having taken place, but asks few hard questions about this accuser's activities as an "escort". There is no question that if three men crossed the line and raped this woman, they should be charged - but the spinning of this story as a lacrosse team offense has gone much too far.
Posted by: Amicuriae | April 02, 2006 at 01:49 PM
Obviously the poster wants to sound off about personal events in his own life and not the facts as they relate to this case.
Posted by: | April 04, 2006 at 06:06 PM
If you look at the feuding neighbor's statement, the police arrival time (in 2 minutes), and the listen to the first 911 call - you'll see that one of the dancer's made that first call. It all fits meshes together perfectly.
The woman caller says a white guy on the Duke Wall (opposite side of the street) yelled out a racial slur and her and her black girlfriend. The neighbor saw both women leave together - a white guy on the duke wall yell out a racial comment as the pulled away. 2 minutes later the police arrived. The neighbor saw the boys leave right after the racial comment was made while they were pulling away.
The neighbor also didn't see any other confrontations with any other group of people or persons that night. No comments made to other vehicles.
One of the dancer's made that call. It's obvious.. and the woman said I wasn't hurt in any way and it's not really an emergency.
Why isn't this info in the press. The TV shows are STILL saying there was a separate corroborating 911 call, when it was part of the event - ONE AND THE SAME.
Posted by: John | April 06, 2006 at 04:24 AM