On May 11, 2006 author and blogger Wendy McElroy told readers:
William Anderson, a valued friend and an astute social commentor, posted the following observation on the Lacrosse travesty, which I reprint in full...McElroy went on to link to a just published Raleigh N&O story which began:On April 21, I wrote on this blog [LewRockwell.com] regarding an important witness for the defense in the Duke non-rape case:
"I would not be surprised if Mostafa starts finding himself harassed by authorities, and even receives a "friendly" visit or two from assistant DAs and the police. They will be desperate to force him to change his testimony, and if they cannot do that, they will try to trump up charges against him or, at the least, regulatory violations regarding his business."
That moment has arrived.
A Durham police detective investigating the Duke University lacrosse case arrested an alibi witness Wednesday on a 2 1/2-year-old misdemeanor warrant.What McElroy called to her readers' attention wasn’t Bill Anderson’s first or most important “on the money” Duke Hoax call.
Taxi driver Moezeldin Elmostafa said Investigator R.D. Clayton and another officer asked whether he had anything new to tell them about the rape case before driving him to the Durham County jail. He said no and was held for five hours, until a friend posted his bail on a shoplifting charge."[…]
Take a look at this with which Bill ended his Apr. 15, 2006 column:
If this situation were not so politically charged, I seriously doubt whether rape charges would follow.Two days after Bill’s column appeared, then DA Mike Nifong, with help from certain Durham Police officers and cheered on by many at Duke, obtained indictments of two Duke students – Collin Finnerty and Reade Seligmann - he knew were innocent.
Instead, we see something much worse, politics and government in action to railroad people into prison. What happened at the Duke party was ugly, but what has transpired since then is even uglier.
And three days after the two students were arrested and charged, Duke University President Richard H. Brodhead told a Durham Chamber of Commerce audience “whatever they did was bad enough.”
It would be another nine months before Brodhead and Duke’s BOT Chair Robert Steel would calculate it was in their best interests for Brodhead to finally say something critical of Nifong.
Take a bow, Bill Anderson.
3 comments:
Thanks, John! At the time, I came to realize that Nifong would stop at nothing. Furthermore, I also realized that the powers that be in Durham had no intention of stopping him either, and that they actually supported this travesty.
It has been a long ride, and I hope it is not over yet. There still is justice to be done.
Thanks to both of you, Bill and John, for all of your courageous and insightful reporting throughout this shameful saga. Please keep up the good work, and best wishes to you both. --Bob Hyde, Duke '67
Timely and incisive blogging by Bill Anderson made a positive difference in this historic case.
These were my thoughts as I drove the National Road through Frostburg over Thanksgiving weekend in beautiful western Maryland. The students in the Economics Department at Frostburg State University are privileged to have Professor Anderson.
Thanks, Bill.
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