Plum Crazy

In the first case you reference, the DNA was able to exclude the man. In the Duke case, they were unable to exclude any of the accused via the DNA tests. It's not the same. DNA is not available in a lot of rape cases.

As such, until the prosecution's side of the story is told, I'd really appreciate you not slamming this case. Whether you mean to or not, you're also casting aspersions on the victim. Until you've heard all the evidence, rather than just the evidence the defense has released, please just stop it. Obviously the defense is releasing all the evidence favorable to its side. The prosecution hasn't released any evidence yet.

Unless you want to revoke my author privileges, please don't tell me to "stop it." Within reason, I should be free to write about whatever I want, even if you disagree with it. In terms of the case, I am not relying only on what the defense has presented. I am relying on stories from journalists who have conducted their own investigation into the case, spoken with prosecutors throughout the country, and spoken with legal experts. There is agreement that Nifong got too far in front of the issue without first gathering all the facts or conducting his investigation. The police conducted a flawed line-up, there is no DNA evidence that links any of the players to the alleged victim, the alleged victim's story is inconsistent, Nifong never interviewed the alleged victim, no one has interviewed any of the players charged, the alleged victim said one of the men had facial hair and no one she picked out in the line-up, which was essentially rigged, had facial hair at the time of the attack, and the second dancer is adamant that no rape occurred. IMO, that is ample evidence that Nifong mishandled the case from the beginning and is guilty of misconduct.

First, you are incorrect in some of your statements of fact, especially regarding what the second woman said. She wouldn't know. She wasn't with the first woman the entire time, as she said herself. Also, please have enough respect to refer to them as women. They are not defined by their careers. Regardless, we'll talk about this more offline.

Having said that, a lot of women who read this blog have been raped, and I will not have this blog turned into a place where they read the kinds of arguments that were used against them when they tried to get people to believe they were raped. I will not have them face snark on the subject of rape. You didn't even write a thoughtful post on the subject, examining the evidence that has been presented (which, I will say once again, is only the defense's evidence; no one has heard the prosecution's evidence yet). You wrote two sarcastic, accusatory posts. Think how that might make a woman who has been raped feel.

Feel free to post whatever you want on House that Ruth Built. But some things are absolutely off-limits on Plum Crazy. If you can live with that, great. If you can't, so be it.

Yes, I said that I wouldn't post a response, but there are two points that I would like to respond publicly to.

Generally, I am predisposed to believe women when they say were raped. Despite the disposition of the Kobe Bryant case, I believe the woman was raped. I don't mean to come across as someone trotting out the usual arguments used against accusers, and I don't think I did trot out these arguments (e.g, I didn't say she was dressed provocatively or was an erotic dancer and had it coming). I simply believe that there are a lot of questions in the case and in the way it was handled, and I find the DNA evidence compelling.

Also, I didn't refer to the second woman as a dancer to demean her. I referred to the men as the players rather than as the men. I equally defined them by their careers.