By Staff
In Durham, N.C., July 26, former prosecutor Mike Nifong acknowledged there is "no credible" evidence that three Duke lacrosse players committed any of the crimes he accused them of more than a year ago.
For the first time, Nifong offered a complete and unqualified apology.
"We all need to heal," he said. "It is my hope we can start this process today.
Nifong's apology came as a judge began considering whether to hold the disgraced former Durham County district attorney in criminal contempt of court for his handling of the case.
Superior Court Judge W. Osmond Smith III already concluded there is probable cause to believe Nifong "willfully and intentionally made false statements of material fact" to the court during a hearing in the case last fall.
If Smith finds Nifong in contempt after an Aug. 30 hearing, the disbarred former prosecutor could face up to 30 days in jail.
The cautionary note in Nifong's demise is that we as fallible humans tend to rely on our preconceived notions.
How was he able to convince a community of academics and the national media that three falsely accused lacrosse players raped a black stripper?
Because his lies supported a nugget of suspicion that privileged white athletes full of beer might behave that badly.
The scenario could be replaying in Iraq with New Republic's Baghdad diarist "Scott Thomas," supposedly a pseudonym for a real soldier who sent three dispatches since January.
Thomas' reports have cast U.S. troops in the worst possible light with claims of soldiers ridiculing a defaced woman, running over dogs and desecrating babies' remains.
Perhaps these "truths" were published because they seemed to confirm the anti-war left's suspicions about our military, despite lip service to supporting the troops.
This is the same magazine that fired an editor, Stephen Glass, in the 1990s for fabricating stories.
We should be skeptical and withhold judging our troops harshly until these stories have been investigated further.