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5 of 5 found the following review helpful:
The Case where the Victims were the Lacrosse Players and the Coach Jul 07, 2009
You need to buy R. B. Parrish's THE DUKE LACROSSE CASE: A DOCUMENTARY HISTORY AND ANALYSIS OF THE MODERN SCOTTSBORO even if you already have the two best books on the subject so far, Taylor-Johnson UNTIL PROVEN INNOCENT and the Yaeger-Pressler IT'S NOT ABOUT THE TRUTH. Taylor called the Internet LIESTOPPERS Forum "an amazing performance of journalism on the fly." Well, his and Johnson's UPI was an amazing performance of history written on the fly. IT'S NOT ABOUT THE TRUTH remains essential for lacrosse-coach Pressler's contributions, which include his daughter Janet's brave 24 March 2007 letter to the hapless President of Duke University, Richard Brodhead. Parrish's book, THE DUKE LACROSSE CASE, walks the reader step by step through several appalling and sometimes downright horrific sequences.
"Case Narrative: Before the Beginning" sets up the background of Durham police department and Duke University cooperation in cracking down on underage drinking in off-campus housing. "The Party" traces the events of 13 and 14 March 2006 which culminated with a black stripper, Crystal Mangum, falsely accusing a varying number of white lacrosse players with raping and beating her. "The Road to the Hospital" traces the start of the case, a 911 call by Mangum's stripping partner, claiming that fraternity boys used offensive language. Mangum, who had a police record of making false accusations of rape, belatedly began making rape charges, retracting them, and repeating them.
The next section, "How Law Enforcement Responded," (pages 45-182), worth the price of the book, is a meticulous reconstruction of failure of the hospital to follow procedures, of flawed police procedures, and of a District Attorney seizing on an obviously shaky case: he would place rape charges against a number of white lacrosse players (three, ultimately) in order win re-election by playing to the black voters of Durham, and he would mount a campaign to smear the whole lacrosse team, assisted by most of the mainstream media and the Duke administration. This section includes full documents such as a 15 May 2006 press conference statement by one of the victims, David Evans.
"How a University Responded" (183-214) is a damning review of the misbehavior of Dean Sue Wasiolek (in advising the students that they did not need lawyers and should not tell their parents they were being investigated) and repeated misbehavior of Duke in violation of the Family and Educational Privacy Act. Richard Brodhead behaved strangely, refusing to meet with the parents or with the attorneys of the lacrosse players while meeting with many of their accusers and while releasing statements that deplored racism, denounced "physical coercion and sexual assault," and spoke repeatedly of "very serious penalties" from Duke and the courts. Brodhead implied repeatedly that the players were guilty, as when he announced that whatever they did was bad enough. Rather than stepping in to assert order, he turned a blind eye to hate groups among the faculty and city and external hate groups like Black Panthers, many of whom threatened the innocent students with castration or death.
"How the Media Responded" (215-233) does not attempt a full description, for the feeding frenzy of the main stream media would take a long book to describe, but it does expose the local papers for a relentless assault on the students and shows the damage done by NEWSWEEK, in particular, on 1 May 2006. Parrish quotes the NEWSWEEK editor Evan Thomas on that issue of the magazine as saying that the "narrative was right, but the facts were wrong." These words make it clear that Evan Thomas did not learn the lesson of his maligning of the students: in truth, the so-called facts were cruelly wrong, and the narrative was also cruelly wrong. This section ends with the statement of another of the victims, Reade Seligmann, at the Bar Hearing of District Attorney Nifong on 15 June 2007. Like Dave Evans's statement, this brings home the devastation visited upon the lacrosse players and their families.
"How a Community Responded" (235-254) is a terrifying section which makes it seem miraculous that the false charges did not end in the murder of one or more innocent lacrosse players. The rest of the book deals with the exposure of the misconduct by the district attorney, police, and others, and offers, a little wistfully, an agenda for reform.
So far, the rogue DA Michael Nifong, has been disbarred and has spent one night in jail, but his supporters have held fund raisers for him and are actively working to rehabilitate his reputation. Brodhead's contract was extended in the Fall of 2007, shortly after the Taylor-Johnson book described his "extraordinary moral meltdown"--UNTIL PROVEN INNOCENT (p. 122). Duke faced up to misbehavior under Brodhead, settling with the three indicated players for a figure cited variously as between $18,000,000 and $30,000,000. Now, lawsuits are progressing, very slowly. Brodhead is being sued by Michael Pressler, the Duke lacrosse coach he fired, for violating terms of their agreement. He is being sued by three unindicted lacrosse players. On 21 February 2008 thirty eight members of the lacrosse team and several of their parents filed a lawsuit against Durham and Duke officials, including Brodhead, making such charges as these: "BRODHEAD'S ACTS IN FURTHERANCE OF THE CONSPIRACY TO FABRICATE THE 'RACIST' DIMENSIONS TO MANGUM'S FALSE RAPE."----"BRODHEAD AND STEEL CONSCIOUSLY PARTICIPATING IN THE FRAMING OF THEIR OWN STUDENTS"----"FALSE PUBLIC STATEMENTS IN VIOLATION OF 42 U.S.C. §1983"----"INTERFERING WITH RIGHT ENGAGE IN POLITICAL PROCESSES IN VIOLATION OF 42 U.S.C. §1983 AND CONSPIRACY"----RETALIATION IN VIOLATION OF 42 U.S.C. §1983 & CONSPIRACY"--"COMMON LAW OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE & CONSPIRACY"----"INTENTIONAL INFLICTION OF EMOTIONAL DISTRESS AND CONSPIRACY"--"BREACH OF CONTRACT." Something like justice may yet be done. Meanwhile, the more exposure in books like R. B. Parrish's the better.
The Duke Lacrosse Case: A Documentary History and Analysis of the Modern Scottsboro
2 of 5 found the following review helpful:
The Scottsboro Boys as a Template for the Duke Rape Hoax Jun 18, 2009
The author lays out the Duke University lacrosse team rape hoax charges in 2006 along side the The Scottsboro Boys rape hoax of 1931 and looks for similarities in how the two communities and law enforcement reacted to the charges brought against the young men.
In the 1931 case it is known that the community 'perceived' the young men to be guilty and continued to 'perceive' guilt for decades throughout many trials.
For the 2006 Duke University lacrosse rape hoax case the 'perception' of guilt by members of the Durham and Duke University communities seemed to be a forgone conclusion for the moment the young men were arrested.
Is it possible that members of the Duke and Durham community used the recorded history of the Scottsboro case as a template in their effort to 'railroad' the 'perception' of guilt for young privileged white male athletes as was witnessed in 1931 for the young black males?
The authors attention to detail certainly clarifies many similarities between the two cases and make a compelling argument that all Federal and State of North Carolina law suits with Durham and Duke as defendants need to move forward. Even thought the Attorney General of the State of North Carolina declared the three members of the Duke University lacrosse team to be innocent of all changes.
Many examples are given where perceptions are demonstrated to be an unacceptable substitute for the truth whether it be in 1931 or 2006/2009.
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