Topic category:  Other/General

My July 22, 2006 Duke case article is titled "Does Destine Play a Part in the Duke Rape Hoax?".

No typos in that title.

If my friend Bill Anderson is right, that question probably will not be answered.

Bill's latest article on the Duke case--"Why There Will Be No Criminal Investigation in the Duke Case"--is pessimistic about real reform resulting the revelation that innocent young men were persecuted by a Democrat district attorney running in a Democrat primary and desperate to capture the black vote that would decide the election.

On the need for a criminal investigation, Bill is certain (and absolutely right).

But Bill is almost as certain that neither the State of North Carolina nor the federal government will dare to investigate (and, tragically, probably right).

The unwillingness of the State of North Carolina to do so is, as I've said before, a Democrat scandal. With Democrats in control of the governorship and the attorney generalship in North Carolina and local government in Durham, the Democrat interest in perpetuating their black bloc vote and their political power so dependent upon it, the slightest temptation to expose the whole ugly truth will be suppressed.

Bill agrees: "[I]t clearly is not in [Democrat North Carolina Attorney General Roy] Cooper’s interests nor in the interests of the North Carolina Democratic Party for there to be a further investigation, especially since all of the principals on the prosecution side were Democrats. Along those lines, we also hear silence from the attorneys for the three young men who clearly saw everything Nifong and the police were doing. The most visible attorneys, Wade Smith and Joe Cheshire, both are among the most influential Democrats in the state, and they are not about to damage their party to encourage more action against Nifong.

Some put partisan politics above the rule of law.

That's NOT the way it should be.

Bill:

"...despite the fact that the much criminal behavior already has been exposed, and the lawsuit is likely to expose even more of the same, the criminal authorities are not interested. The reason is....

"....simple: the politics of race. Seligmann, Finnerty, and Evans are white, and their accuser, Crystal Gail Mangum, is black. The NAACP, and other black organizations had staked all of their credibility to the charges being true, and desperately tried to keep the case alive, even when it was exposed as a lie....."

Bill went on to explain that it's even worse than that: "Furthermore, the rape crisis organizations and feminist groups also refused to let go of the lies that propelled this case in the first place. The radical faculty members, employees, administrators and students at Duke also rebelled at seeing this 'opportunity' slip through their fingers, so they insisted that Cooper either had covered up the evidence or had been kowtowing to white supremacists. In other words, even the truth could not stop business as usual, so people from these groups simply comforted themselves with the Big Lie that the players were guilty of rape, but were going to skirt justice because of their race and family incomes."

Bill doubts that Attorney General Cooper will risk a criminal investigation: "It is not hard to see how this would affect Cooper’s decision to avoid any criminal investigation. Cooper is a Democrat with aspirations of being governor, and in North Carolina, the only way for Democrats to win a state-wide election is through heavy turnout from blacks and radical/leftist whites. That members of these groups were bitterly disappointed when the case fell apart means that Cooper cannot do anything to further earn their enmity."

With the last sentence (and only the last sentence), I disagree.

I think that Mr. Cooper saved himself with the black bloc vote by announcing, in addition to his beliefs that the Three were innocent and Mr. Nifong had been a rogue prosecutor, a careeer-saving belief that false accuser Crystal Gail Mangum was deluded and a decision not to prosecute her. (The original Tawana Brawley was not prosecuted either.)

Remember that Wade Smith, an attorney for Collin Finnerty who had mentored North Carolina presidential hopeful John Edwards and chaired the North Carolina Democrat Party, quickly announced after that much-desired-by-the-defense declaration of innocence that there was no need to pursue much-less-important-to-the-defense criminal charges against the false accuser.

Why didn't the Attorney General instead press Ms. Mangum to make a deal: leniency, even mental treatment, for the whole truth as to how she came to pick David Evans, Reade Seligmann and Collin Finnerty, none of whom matched the descriptions of her non-attackers that she gave to Detective Himan?

Shouldn't Ms. Mangum have been asked whether an old friend from high school working in the Durham County, North Carolina District Attorney's Office (and the son of a key Nifong backer) looked her up after she claimed to have been gang raped by vicious white guys?

C. Destine Couch was hired by rogue prosecutor Mike Nifong soon after he was appointed interim district attorney. His no longer available myspace website spoke volumes about him and gave a narcissistic meaning to the expression, "I picture of a man wearing only a towel speaks a thousand words."

In an October 3, 2006 post titled "NiFibber & Big CL Joined at the, um, hips?" (including a cropped photograph), the insightful (and inciting) Mike (Crystal Mess) McCusker noted: "Nifong and [Herald-Sun editor, Bob Ashley, and writer, John Stevenson] have not, as yet, enlightened voters as to the pre-March 14, 2006 relationship, if any, between Big C and Crystal, despite their common graduation year from the same high school, their respective enrollments at NCCU at overlapping times, their common involvement in the Triangle 'adult entertainment industry,' and Willie Gary, Esq. having allegedly been contacted by Crystal's representatives to monitor the propriety of civil claims being brought on her behalf as a result of the events of March 14th. Gary, of course, previously represented Finesse, as administratrix of the estate of another son, in litigation against Duke University."

"Finesse" is Finesse Couch, Destiny's mom, the Durham County Bar Association's president and Nifong's benefactress with Durham's black PAC (not to mention her $1,000 contribution to his election campaign).

Mike:

"Speaking of the President of the Durham County Bar Association, Nifong and Ashley and Stevenson would rather you forget that Finesse's son is none other than Assistant District Attorney, C. Destine Couch, a/k/a Big C.

"On the front page of Nifibber's official publicity portfolio there are links to his 'Tested Staff.' When one clicks on link to The Whole Staff thereunder, one is greeted by a group shot of suits and staffers described as

the largest, most diverse, best educated, and most capable collection of people ever assembled under that title. They are part of the package you get with District Attorney Mike Nifong."

For a sense of what type of fellow Destiny is, go to http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a340/12_C/adapimp1.jpg. It includes, among other things, his motto ("Come get some"), self-description, interests and photos of "Ghana" and "Chocolate Luver," two of his 1837 friends.

Interestingly, Ashley Cannon, another Nifong assistant district attorney to whom Mr. Nifong appeared to have been very much indebted, got nowhere when she complained to him about Destiny and opted to leave the office.

On November 6, 2006, LieStoppers reported it this way:

"Just when we thought the absurdity of this drama could not get any more bizarre, it appears that loyal ADA Ashley Cannon has broken ranks by leaving the District Attorney’s office on the eve of the election amid a brewing sexual harassment scandal. Time and again, Ms. Cannon had proven herself a loyal subordinate to DA Nifong, and it appears that her reward was to be subjected to an alleged pattern of sexual harassment within the DA’s office.

"In the spring, Ms. Cannon provided campaign ammunition for Nifong in his hard fought primary election battle against bitter rival Freda Black, by alleging that Defense Attorney Jerry Clayton assured her that if Black won, her job would be safe. Ms. Cannon also demonstrated her loyalty to Nifong by arguing for the reinstatement and prosecution of alcohol and noise violations charges against lacrosse team captains David Evans and Dan Flannery. Her greatest attempted contribution to the Hoax, however, was her aggressive, though failed, prosecution of defense witness Moezeldin Elmostafa.

"Despite Ms. Cannon’s willingness to go to bat for Nifong in each of these instances, it appears that Nifong was unwilling to return the favor when Ms. Cannon came to him with a sexual harassment complaint against ADA C. Destine Couch. While the Snooze Room again lives up to its name by ignoring the brewing scandal, the News & Observer and blogger KC Johnson are reporting that Ms. Cannon has left the DA’s office in response to the alleged pattern of sexual harassment, and Nifong’s apparent refusal to attend to the issue."

"Without passing judgment on the merits or timing of Ms. Cannon’s complaint, it should be noted that her allegations represent a fittingly ironic conclusion to the election campaign. While DA Nifong pretends that his responsibility to continue his hijacked Hoax stems from the social issues the Hoax represents, it appears that within his own office he fails to address an equally troubling social concern. Adding to the irony, in Ms. Cannon, we have a formerly loyal subordinate, and a genuine champion of women’s issues who serves on the Orange County Commission for Women, and the board of the Family Violence Prevention Center of Orange County, and yet her complaints are ignored by the man who pretends to be a social crusader."

Are you curious as to why Mr. Nifong sided with Destine instead of Ashley (especially since we have learned from the Duke case that the merits are not important to Mr. Nifong)?

If Ms. Mangum is not to be prosecuted, she at least should explain whether anyone discussed with her which innocent young men she should pick before she finally picked them and what she did in preparation for that big money civil case that never materialized.

Although "extremely reluctant to call for federal action," Bill duly noted that the federal government too has grounds to investigate: "[T]here are a number of avenues the feds could take. Most certainly, Durham and Nifong used federal grants from the Violence Against Women Act in pursuit of this case, and the fraudulent use of federal money has landed many people in prison before. There are massive conspiracies to deprive Seligmann, Finnerty, and Evans of their Constitutional Rights, and there are the usual sets of 'fraud' and 'conspiracy' charges that the feds do not seem hesitant in using elsewhere.'"

Bill's explanation of federal inaction:

"The main reason for the reluctance of the feds to be involved, as I see it, is the Jena case....

"***

"While there was a federal investigation of the Jena case, the absence of charges there means that if the feds were to attempt to investigate the Duke case and subsequently bring charges, the outcry among the black groups and black congressional Democrats would be very loud. Given its precarious situation from the Republican loss of Congress to its declining fortunes in Iraq, the Bush Administration simply is not going to pursue anything in the Duke case that will make it subject to even more accusations of racism....

"(The Bush Administration also still is smarting from its total failure in the wake of Hurricane Katrina and the subsequent charges that its failure has been due to racist attitudes. Actually, its failure is due to the fact that it is attempting to implement socialist 'solutions' which always are doomed to fail. This is the reason for the continual post-Katrina stumbling in New Orleans, but those who are most loudly crying 'racism' also support socialism.)"

If that turns out to be the case, it will be a Bush Justice Department disgrace.

Michael J. Gaynor

Biography - Michael J. Gaynor

Michael J. Gaynor has been practicing law in New York since 1973. A former partner at Fulton, Duncombe & Rowe and Gaynor & Bass, he is a solo practitioner admitted to practice in New York state and federal courts and an Association of the Bar of the City of New York member.

Gaynor graduated magna cum laude, with Honors in Social Science, from Hofstra University's New College, and received his J.D. degree from St. John's Law School, where he won the American Jurisprudence Award in Evidence and served as an editor of the Law Review and the St. Thomas More Institute for Legal Research. He wrote on the Pentagon Papers case for the Review and obscenity law for The Catholic Lawyer and edited the Law Review's commentary on significant developments in New York law.

The day after graduating, Gaynor joined the Fulton firm, where he focused on litigation and corporate law. In 1997 Gaynor and Emily Bass formed Gaynor & Bass and then conducted a general legal practice, emphasizing litigation, and represented corporations, individuals and a New York City labor union. Notably, Gaynor & Bass prevailed in the Second Circuit in a seminal copyright infringement case, Tasini v. New York Times, against newspaper and magazine publishers and Lexis-Nexis. The U.S. Supreme Court affirmed, 7 to 2, holding that the copyrights of freelance writers had been infringed when their work was put online without permission or compensation.

Gaynor currently contributes regularly to www.MichNews.com, www.RenewAmerica.com, www.WebCommentary.com, www.PostChronicle.com and www.therealitycheck.org and has contributed to many other websites. He has written extensively on political and religious issues, notably the Terry Schiavo case, the Duke "no rape" case, ACORN and canon law, and appeared as a guest on television and radio. He was acknowledged in Until Proven Innocent, by Stuart Taylor and KC Johnson, and Culture of Corruption, by Michelle Malkin. He appeared on "Your World With Cavuto" to promote an eBay boycott that he initiated and "The World Over With Raymond Arroyo" (EWTN) to discuss the legal implications of the Schiavo case. On October 22, 2008, Gaynor was the first to report that The New York Times had killed an Obama/ACORN expose on which a Times reporter had been working with ACORN whistleblower Anita MonCrief.

Gaynor's email address is gaynormike@aol.com.