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In the Duke case - 88 members of the Duke arts and science faculty--the so-called Gang of 88--signed a public statement praising campus demonstrators who had distributed a "WANTED" poster that branded the lacrosse players as "rapists." The Gang of 88 didn't use that term, but its statement referred to "what happened to this young woman." Ignoring calls to wait for the evidence, the gang instead went into full social-justice gear - what do you think the odds are ANY of them will issue an apology ?
Update 9/29/07: Duke President Apologizes
DURHAM, N.C. (AP) — Duke University President Richard Brodhead apologized Saturday for not better supporting the men's lacrosse players falsely accused in last year's highly publicized rape scandal.
Brodhead, speaking at the university's law school, said he regretted Duke's "failure to reach out" in a "time of extraordinary peril" after a woman accused three players of raping at a March 2006 party thrown by the team.
"Given the complexities of this case, getting the communication right would never have been easy," Brodhead said. "But the fact is that we did not get it right, causing the families to feel abandoned when they were most in need of support. This was a mistake. I take responsibility for it and I apologize for it."
As authorities began to investigate the allegations, Brodhead and the university initially suspended the highly ranked team from play. He later canceled the remainder of its season and ousted longtime coach Mike Pressler. Meanwhile, Durham County prosecutor Mike Nifong labeled the team "hooligans" as he searched for suspects.
But even as Nifong won indictments against players Reade Seligmann, Collin Finnerty and Dave Evans, it became clear the allegations had no merit.
State prosecutors determined in February the accuser's story was a lie, and North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper called the three players innocent victims of Nifong's "tragic rush to accuse."
Nifong was disbarred in June for more than two dozen violations of the state bar's rules of professional conduct, including withholding results of critical DNA tests, and resigned from office. He spent one night in jail earlier this month after a judge held him in criminal contempt of court for lying to a court about having provided those test results to defense attorneys.
In the early days of the case, Brodhead was generally cautious in his comments, saying the players should be presumed innocent while also insisting the crimes alleged had no place at the elite private university.
Brodhead said Saturday he worried that making numerous public comments could be interpreted as an attempt by Duke to "influence the judicial process," especially since Nifong was insisting a crime had occurred.
That may have created an impression that Duke did not care about the accused students, Brodhead said, which he said was untrue but still something he regrets.
"Duke needed to be clear that it demanded fair treatment for its students," he said. "I took that completely for granted. If anyone doubted it, then I should have been more explicit, especially as the evidence mounted that the prosecutor was not acting in accordance with the standards of his profession."
Brodhead also said the school could have done more to show that some members of Duke's faculty who were openly critical of the lacrosse team did not speak for the university as a whole.
Duke has reached private settlements with Pressler, now the coach at Division II Bryant in Rhode Island, as well as the three cleared players and a teammate who was not indicted but accused a professor of giving him a failing grade because he was a lacrosse player.
Brodhead said the university is planning a national conference of lawyers, educators and student affairs leaders to discuss how schools should deal with students facing serious criminal charges.
A.C. observation:
The one real example of racism on a college campus in recent memory was perpetrated against white men of the Duke lacrosse team. As that injustice was being perpetrated, gender and ethnic professors at Duke kept droning on about the "racism and sexism" students "live with every day" – as the professors put it in an open letter that falsely presumed the players were guilty of rape. We don't expect a rally against the prejudiced professors, but an apology might be nice.
Update: Nifong apologized / disbarred / discredited / disgraced..The 88 faculty members escaped public apology as part of the Duke / Innocents agreement (CYA) which reportedly netted each falsely-charged/instantly convicted a 7 figure sum.
Hmm, well, since the Duke Conservative Union just placed a full-page ad in the Duke Chronicle bitching at the "radical" 88 professors and calling them a disaster and an outrage, me thinks you've been watching FOX News again :)
Regardless of where amblessed got his information it does look like Gang of 88 has egg on their face.
One thing I've always said is you have to be careful which horse you hook your wagon to.
The question was - what do you think the odds are ANY of them will issue an apology ?
