Wednesday, December 31, 2008

December Events in the Case

New developments in the civil suit, and old names up to no good dominated December.

A Duke filing issued a blunt warning to parents of prospective students at the institution: the Faculty Handbook might require professors to teach students with respect, and the student bulletin might state that Duke students should not experience discrimination based on race, gender, or other personal status, but “the Duke bulletin is not a valid contract.” In another words: if a new manifestation of the Group of 88 chooses to go after your son, the university sees itself under no legal obligation to enforce its own policies.

Attorneys for the lacrosse players discovered that in a filing claiming partial immunity, Durham attorneys had decided to . . . rewrite . . . the precise wording of the city's insurance policy to conform to the recent Pettiford decision that seemed to expand a city's ability to shield itself from lawsuits under North Carolina law.

Durham attorneys piled up more legal fees in a filing admitting that they had . . . incorrectly . . . transcribed the wording of the city's insurance policy to make it seem as if Durham's policy was the same as the city's policy in Pettiford. But, they claimed, they still deserved immunity.

Tracey Cline implied an upcoming office purge for those who don't conform to her idea of "justice" and "teamwork."

The Rev. William Barber continued to dissemble, and in an almost comically inept fashion.

Duke Magazine presented an intriguing view of security on campus; and also provided the first time that a Duke publication has conceded on the record that the University possessed some legal jurisdiction over the events at the lacrosse house.

Duke is appealing an unfavorable ruling in the Pressler lawsuit.

And Reade Seligmann received the Intercollegiate Men's Lacrosse Coaches Association (IMLCA) Boston Market Humanitarian Award for his work on behalf of the Innocence Project.

There is, of course, a dissenting view of Seligmann's character, expressed by Richard Brodhead in his first public appearance after Seligmann's arrest on trumped-up charges. Even if Seligmann and Collin Finnerty were innocent, Brodhead proclaimed, "whatever they did was bad enough." The president has never retracted or apologized for his statement.

43 comments:

Jhn1 said...

wouldn't the "transcription error" and the defense of same amount to verifiable malpractice?
Poor judgment in argument or poor arguments are part of the "defense of the indefensible", but specific misrepresentations of written fact erroneously or falsely included in written pleadings to the court?

Duke might be able to get some of the money back, or the insurance company might be able to get that law firm removed from the case.

Anonymous said...

Stop lying, will you? No civil rights were violated! They're going to get nothing. Zero, Zilch, Nada.

Anonymous said...

Thank you for the updates - perhaps a full year in review would be in order with a "looking ahead" for 2009. One can only hope and pray that justice will be done this coming year - Duke and Durham will be forced to pay big bucks and those individuals, Levicy, Brodhead, Steele, Hunman, Gottleib, Wilson, and Nifong (among others) will also be held accountable for their misdeeds.
cks

Anonymous said...

* Steele, Hunman, Gottleib *

if you are going to properly

frame everybody, please spell

their names correctly.

Anonymous said...

To 3:14. You sound almost hysterical. What "lying" that you beg to be stopped are you specifically referring to?

Anonymous said...

Anonymous 3:14 AM (aka Brodhead's lap poodle)-

It must be tough for you, having to read the truth. If your master, Brodhead, has done nothing wrong, shouldn't he welcome the opportunity to "prove himself innocent" at civil trial. After all, that was the position he called for with the innocent, but wrongly framed, Duke students.

I expect that 2009 will prove to be a much worse year for Brodhead (and his dependent lap poodles) than was 2008. For one thing, he will no longer be able to buy his way out of facing the truth.

(3:14 AM ???... having trouble sleeping at night?)

Anonymous said...

Dems and liberals do it again. The Blago-Burris-Reid mess.

Once again, a stampede to rush to judgement. Blago is demonized, maybe rightly so. He is the duly elected Governor, and has not been indicted. His duty is to appoint a Senator. He did so. Reid and Senate Dems freak out. Rush to judgement? Must be genetic. Maybe we could call it the Brodhead syndrome.

Anonymous said...

I love how somone anonymously tells you to stop lying... Funny coming from anonymous myself.

Gary Packwood said...

KC said...

...In another words: if a new manifestation of the Group of 88 chooses to go after your son, the university sees itself under no legal obligation to enforce its own policies.
::
Perhaps Duke is starting a trend that will result in the development and sale of a new insurance product for students allowing parents or student to initiate legal proceedings against the professor ...personally.

That would keep a faculty member tied up in depositions for the rest of eternity while Duke tries to distance itself for this new insurance product apply named ...Student Protection from Errant Campus Pot-Bangers or for short, The Duke Pot-Banger Insurance Rider.

I'm sure Duke alums would not object to providing liability insurance coverage for the G88 (and staff) at an annual premium of, oh shall we say, $1M...each?
::
GP

Anonymous said...

Anon:

Sorry that I made a typo - Hinman rather than Hunman though one could perhaps argue that his Hunnish behavior led to the slip of the fingers while stroking the keys!
cks

Anonymous said...

Is Broadhead a Communist?

Anonymous said...

cks:

You have several misspellings.

Steele should be Steel.
Hunman (and Hinman) should be Himan.
Gottleib should be Gottlieb.

Anon 10:09:

You used the wrong verb. cks did not "frame" anyone. The verb "frame" is used to describe the act of incriminating (an innocent person) through the use of false evidence, information, etc.

She merely accused a number of individuals of misdeeds in connection with this case. She has not used false evidence to "incriminate" anyone.

Anonymous said...

Actually, it is Ben Himan!

Anonymous said...

There you go again Gary Packwood, good post!

Happy New Year from your old friend

Anonymous said...

* Steele, Hunman, Gottleib *

$ Steel, Himan, Gottlieb $

My goodness, and you people

complain about a comma.

Really, you are all utterly

misinformed, deliberately.

Don't worry about Duke.

Your boys should appreciate

that Duke did save their asses.

Right, KC ?

Anonymous said...

I hope that Pressler is able to sue the pants off duke!! He was found to have done nothing wrong by the Colmen committee and they still fired him. Broadhead demonstrated that he has absolutely no backbone in firing him as a means to pander to the radical left wing faculty members of duke. The fact that the duke 88 members still refuse to apologize just shows that they are nothing more than a sick joke!!!

Anonymous said...

3:14 & 10:09

You surely are kidding. The only way you can say what you did was to either be one of the guilty or be married to one of the guilty. I trust you are a resident of Durham (that would only be fair--bird(brains) of a feather and all that good stuff.

As for the newly stated Duke policy, they are just now realizing that there is a need to put on paper a policy that they have followed for a while. Will they also put in writing a statement that the FERPA law will not be followed at Duke? Will they put in writing that students who do not absolutely follow the PC police (aka Duke faculty) will be thrown under the first passing bus? Will they put in writing a statement that faculty members are not bound by the faculty handbook?

BTW, does Duke have an Honor Code????? That would be an oxymoron, wouldn't it??????????

Sid said...

It would seem that Duke has started down a very slippery slope on the issue of faculty conduct. If the Faculty Handbook is not a binding contract, it has no legal value. If Duke is not governing its faculty, then they are responsible independently. Very quickly, Duke faculty members will find themselves in court defending even the most trivial actions.

I realize Duke has to balance short term and long term legal stratagies in this case. The faculty members have dug a deep hole and Duke will have to pay its way out. But to abandon the binding nature of the Faculty Handbook seems short-sighted.

Anonymous said...

I hope you brown nosing idiots are prepared to wait until infinity before any money is given up.

Jesus will return before that ever happens.

Cheers!

Happy New Year

kcjohnson9 said...

To the 1.00am (Prof. Lubiano?):

Reciprocal new year's greetings.

To the 6.11pm:

In dealing with Duke students who played lacrosse, University employees violated the faculty handbook, and violated the student bulletin, and one university employee--Tara Levicy--invented inculpatory evidence.

If that record constitutes "saving," I'd shudder to see what the University's performance in condemning the lacrosse players would have included.

Anonymous said...

"Jesus will return before that ever happens."

And I think he'll have sympathy for persons who were falsely accused and dragged before a mob and condemned by self-righteous clergymen. . .

Debrah said...

A Happy Diva New Year to everyone!

Made much better now to see that KC is on the case pronto to begin 2009.

I've found it astounding throughout this past year that no one is willing to say that they made a mistake and that they are sorry for their gross missteps.

Or at least say that they wish they had not contributed to the injustice of the internationally-publicized Lacrosse Hoax.

It's as if they think the entire world missed their behavior.

Don't know why, really, but the fact that the local papers and publications have never and will never issue a regret or a journalistic apology really gets to me.

Without giving specifics, back in November I had a little meeting with a few of them and openly discussed their editorial pages in 2006 and how their behavior inflamed the case.

Their response was to listen and then say nothing.

Oddly, over the holidays a scathing editorial as well as an op-ed by a syndicated columnist were printed raking VP Dick Cheney over the coals for his missteps.

These journalistic wonders were wondering why Cheney could not simply admit his mistakes and apologize.

Forget how anyone feels about Cheney or how anyone comes down on the war in Iraq......

.......the irony of such a vicious set of plaintive calls for apologies from such people with such a history is quite revolting.

Anonymous said...

to 3:14 -

It is not about what the plaintifs get. It is about what I get; namely, the information hopefully to be provided in discovery of just how poorly all the Duke and Durham defendants behaved during their persecution of these unfortunate young men.

Anonymous said...

It would seem that to issue an apology is a sign of weakness. Of the various people involved in the lacrosse case, the only ones who apologized for their actions were the three young men so wrongly accused (as well as others who either attended or were involved in the planning of the gathering that fateful night as well as Coach Pressler. Brodhead did not apologize for his actions nor did the BOT or Steel. I suppose hell will freeze over before we see anything from Himan, Gottlieb, or Wilson - and as far as Nifong is concerned, he still maintains that something happened that night which justified his actions. Of course, nothing from Crystal Mangum except an insistence that she was raped. As far as the Gang of 88 and their supporters, there has been no apology there either. An apology means that one owns up to making a mistake and a promise to do better in the future. Yes, I made a mistake in my spellings - I promise to do better in the future (my resolution is to get some light in my study so that I can read my computer screen better). Duke's administration should have made a resolution for 2009 - we will apologize for our mishandling of the case and then list those ways in which we were deficient and state what steps will be taken to insure that a similar situation will never occur again. Claiming to put the past behind us and move on (Brodhead's plan) is not an apology and only insures that Duke has learned nothing.
cks

Debrah said...

This is so depressing.

Lubiano's major league goofy writing was on this reading list in the English and Comparative Literature Department in 2004.

Take a look at some of the authors who are listed as well.

And Lubiano is included with them? !!!

Many students don't have parents who have the time because of economic conditions or because they aren't educated themselves enough to negotiate the mine fields of the academy.

However, if parents can't do it, someone must be there to save unsuspecting delicate young minds from this so-called "curriculum".

Lubiano should try a little harder and get herself off the forthcoming list.

She should be working on a real book this time.

It could be titled...."How I Helped Upend Duke At A Cost Of Millions By Mugging Them With My Nifty Metaphors!".

The forward will be written by two lovely friends and admirers---Richard Brodhead and Mary D.B.T. Semans.

Debrah said...

Read this from a decade ago.

This woman is a disaster.

"That sort of thing is a lot of work--which is why I suppose the critics of us don't do it. I have, however, additional, more intellectual reasons for running out of steam."

Read this entire article. You won't believe its incoherence.

Anonymous said...

To the 1 am Group of 88 enabler: It may take a while before enough money changes hands to settle this matter, but just getting the principles at Duke under oath for a deposition will be lots of fun, for some people anyway. Many folks will get to choose, on camera, between admitting to serious felonies or committing transparent perjury. Taking the 5th amendment does not work very well in this situation. Look what happened to OJ Simpson when he got into a civil trial.

Anonymous said...

To 3:14 AM and 1:00 AM, your bleary eyed but totally unrealistic hopes that the plaintiffs will not prevail in the current litigation and that no money will be paid by Duke , Durham, their insurance companies and several individuals are as false as your teaching "credentials". If you have the ability to count, add up the accumulating millions of dollars that Duke and Durham have already spent and will continue to pay out to defense
attornys because Steel and Brodhead were too arroganr and weak to admit their obvious errors in judgment, and they steadfastly refused to look the coach, students and their parents in the eye and say the simple words, "we're sorry." Any amout paid to the plaintiffs will be but a meager percentage of the monetary and reputational damage already cause by the embarrasing "group of 88" and their "stooge" administrators.

Anonymous said...

KC Johnson said...

To the 1.00am (Prof. Lubiano?)

Probably not. It's been published.

Anonymous said...

Just damn Brodhead and the Duke University faculty . . . nothing written or discovered had changed their assinine behavior or their shallow behavior or their myopic views, and as for Durham law enforcement, Rod Steiger's character in the "heat of the night" was more enlightened day or night. Collected together, these people are not want-to-be neanderthanls. They are neanderthals.

Anonymous said...

I remember when Orin Starn used to post here, and KC finally outed him. (Yeah, the gutless wonder posted anonymously.)

I find it hilarious to think that anyone believes Duke saved these kids from anything. After all, the centerpiece of the Change of Venue motion was the behavior of people on the Duke faculty, student body, and administration. That Duke's leadership is NOT ashamed of the fact that it set a "first" in the history of higher education -- being the center of a change of venue motion -- then these people are incapable of shame.

Anonymous said...

To Debra
1/1/09 5:36 PM

I can't even read that without my brain wanting to cross! All I keep thinking while reading it is - What? Huh? Who now? The subject seems to change mid-sentence. It's as if the concept of subject, object, predicate, antecedent, etc. have all been thrown out the window.

Is this some advanced level of communication that only some sort of PhD ninja-master can understand? What if a student turned in an essay written like this? Does the fact that I can't even follow it mean that I'm stupid?

Debrah said...

Two comments from readers of a H-S editorial which was on a very different topic:



another trust gone

Submitted by squid90 on 01/04/2009 @ 08:18 AM

And we trusted the newspapers, specifically the Herald-Sun, to do nothing but report the truth in the Duke lacrosse case. They did not. I lost that trust in news media because of that reporting.





Could not be more wrong

Submitted by sharpshooter on 01/04/2009 @ 09:46 AM

The previous comment could not be more wrong. The Sun-Herald was among the few media outlets that took a step back. You need to remember that in a criminal case the only side talking is generally the Prosecution. This is the result of several factor's. First, they are the only ones completely in possession of all the facts for the first 1/3 of the process, which is the time when the most reporting is generally done on a subject. Second, in most cases, it is smart for a Defendant to play his cards close to the vest. Last, Criminal Defense Attorney's have no political agenda to play too. There sole concern is the best interests of his client. It behooves him (or her) to sit back and collect the information reported in the media, the comments made by the Prosecution, and then decide how best to advise his client. In "The Art Of War", Sun Tzu said "We sharpen our swords quietly", and this is usually the best advice for a criminal Defendant. Because of all of this it is difficult for the press to get a balanced view. Of the media "feeding frenzy" following the Duke Lacrosse incident, I strongly feel the Durham Herald Sun did a much better job than it's competitor in a large, neighboring city, who has a history of rushing to judgement.

Anonymous said...

To the 1/1/09 5:36 PM
I read the entire article as you suggest.
It makes perfect nonsense to me.

Debrah said...

I find it most disconcerting, not to mention more than a little convenient, that J. Peder Zane's blog at the N&O has been wiped out.

That means that the entire archive of posts where many of us---including KC---took Timothy Tyson apart last Spring is gone.

What a boost for the hustling Tyson.......just as his goofy little film is about to surface this year.

Because of many changes at the N&O---firing and cutbacks---Zane is now critiquing books on the blog "Book Club" which someone else was doing earlier.

His previous blog is nowhere to be found.

If anyone finds its archive at some subsequent time, let us know.

Anonymous said...

Debrah said: "This woman is a disaster."

No kidding, but I would argue that's an understatement.

I also note that her book was forthcoming then (in 1999), so this marks the tenth anniversary of her "forthcoming" scholarship. I wonder if she'll get that book written before she retires? I'm not holding my breath on that score.

Anonymous said...

The people charged with defending the horrible behavior of Duke and Durham have consistently misrepresented the facts or circumstances of the case Do they not understand that they are facing competent legal defense? They keep getting caught trying to manipulate anything and everything. Does anyone in the public still think that the young men of the Duke lacrosse team were going to be treated fairly. This country is better than this purposeful dishonesty or the likes of Lubiano and the Duke faculty accusers and the Durham "legal" system.

Anonymous said...

The water must be reaching below the topsoil because the worms are starting to surface!

I believe that you can look for Lubiano to NOT publish in the near future because of pride. Since the Hoax, and the unearthing of her role in it, her lack of publication has been an issue. Now, she feels pressured into publication. Like her decision not to apologize for her lynching, she will not back down from this issue either. It is a win/win for all of us (and especially the students).

To the worms: Do you really think that Duke and Durham will risk a potential $300 million dollar verdict? Heck, they've already paid millions in settlements and millions in suit costs. They will settle when their back is against the wall.

Debrah said...

Here's the blog of the head of Durham's Visitors' Bureau.

Essentially, Durham and Duke's head cheerleader.

It might be interesting to go back through the archives to see what kind of airbrushing was going on for the past few years.

Anonymous said...

Diva: I think you're on to something. In 1999, Lubiano admitted she had nothing to add to her area of study. Explains quite a bit!

fmfnavydoc said...

Brodhead is one of those "leaders" that has his finger in the air, gauging which way the political winds are blowing before he "makes a stand"...unfortunately, he threw the lacrosse team and Pressler under the bus so he wouldn't offend the Group of 88 and the agitators in the Duke/Durham community.

I hope that the those that have sued the school, Durham, Nifong and others involved in this travesty of justice do win in the courts...and those that allowed it to happen are haunted by their actions for the rest of their natural lives.

Anonymous said...

Re: 6:54 PM

In answer to your proposed question to Debra . . . "Yes." The understood subject here, of course, being you as in you is stupid. Work on it although you may have worked hard enough. Thank you, thank you very much. Elvis

Anonymous said...

To the earlier anon:
"Merely " accused them falsely of "misdeeds"!!!!!!!!!!!!
"Merely"?
I thought rape, false imprisonment, drugging and violence in most women,s sstudies departments were considered to demand a more potent word than "misdeeds" and that false accusations of such against Black men in the past a great sin, not merely a misdeed.
What puerile hypocracy, spelling be damned.