DUKE PREZ SAYS RAPE CASE IS TESTING DURHAM
by CASH MICHAELS, The Wilmington Journal, Originally posted 11/26/2006
Brodhead warns of division
[DURHAM] Calling it “an event of some fame…that’s been a burden to us all,” the embattled president of Duke University told the Durham NAACP Saturday that the continuing saga of the Duke lacrosse alleged rape case presents a unique challenge for people on all sides of the racial controversy to “stand together” for the truth, and “…protect ourselves and each other’s humanity.”
He also seemed to suggest that the Duke Three deserved more of a “presumption of innocence” than many supporters believe they’ve been getting.
In his keynote remarks to the Durham NAACP’s 32nd Annual Freedom Fund Banquet Saturday night, Pres. Richard H. Brodhead admonished African-Americans and whites to remember the struggles and accomplishments of the civil rights movement; the positive historical relationship he noted between Duke and Durham; as the legal principles of due process, presumption of innocence and justice based on evidence, as the racially divisive case proceeds towards possible trial.
“And that’s why it seems to me that everyone who is a party to this issue, in this community or elsewhere, has got to understand that our collective community faith requires us to stand together for truth and justice, even in the face of difficult situations, and emotions,” Brodhead, who was warmly received, said.
At no time did the Duke president say anything about the two Black exotic dancers involved, or the three white Duke lacrosse players indicted for allegedly raping and kidnapping one of the females during an off-campus drunken team party last March.
But in surprisingly blunt language, Brodhead said he realized the explosive nature and implications of the allegations, and the tense issues they’ve provoked in the African-American community.
“I do understand that …what was alleged to have happened has a special emotional charge to it because of the idea of white men commandeering Black women for their pleasure has a painful history,” Brodhead read from his prepared remarks to the packed, predominately African-American audience at the Durham Hilton. “It has a history that one would not ignore, and that history was aggravated.”
“And in the spring when it became my burden or mission, some days, to remind people of the presumption of innocence, more than one person from this city asked me if I thought if it had been a Black man and white women, would that person have enjoyed the same presumption of innocence?”
“If it were from me, my answer was, ‘You bet they would.’”
Though Brodhead touted the principle of “presumption of innocence,” many parents of Duke students, and supporters of the university, feel the president displayed very little support for the 47-member lacrosse team after he suspended their national championship-bound season just days after the rape allegations were made public last spring.
In a joint statement, the captains of team publicly apologized for the party, but maintained that no rape occurred. Their coach, however, was forced to resign.
Duke Three supporters have also blasted Pres. Brodhead for not speaking out against what they believe to be a “false prosecution” of the defendants by Durham District Attorney Mike Knifing, based on reportedly scant evidence and an allegedly corrupted police photo ID lineup.
They believe instead of leaving the indicted students at the mercy of authorities, he should have rallied the Duke community in support of their own.
But Brodhead, the ninth Duke president in the prestigious university’s history, seemed to echo, albeit in veiled language, the concerns of many of his critics Saturday evening that the three white defendants may not be able to get a fair trial in Durham because of allegations that many Blacks see them as “privileged” white athletes with high-priced lawyers who, at the very least, were part of group from which racial epithets and threats with a broomstick were allegedly hurled at the Black female dancers.
African-American leaders – who agree that on average, typical Black defendants could never afford the legal firepower defending the Duke Three or generate the equivalent press interest in their claims of innocence - still deny claims that a fair trial with Black jurors impaneled in Durham can’t be conducted.
In delicate terms, Brodhead addressed the reality of African-Americans and whites seeing this case through their own unique racial and historical prisms.
“In truth, in our history, …people have had unequal advantage of the law. Some people have not had the benefit of those presumptions (of innocence), and others have. And I understand that is part of the situation we have lived through.”
Brodhead said he saw an unidentified, but presumably Black person on television last spring saying, “I don’t really care if the accused people are guilty or innocent. I would just be happy to see them convicted.”
Then Pres. Brodhead said he saw a “student leader at North Carolina Central University” say, “ What a stupid thing to say, I don’t know anyone who thinks that. Everyone I know thinks we need to have the truth be established, and then let’s have justice be rendered.”
“The world of due process and the world of justice based on evidence is a world we all need,” the Duke president continued. “We need the benefit of presumption of innocence. We need the benefit of waiting until the facts are in before judgment is rendered. We all need that, though I must say, people who have not had the whole benefit of the law know that they have as much or more to lose than anybody from the opposite world, a world where prejudice is allowed to make decisions.”
“A world in which you can decide whether someone’s guilty by deciding what category of humanity they belong to, or a world in which people feel free to reach conclusions without taking the trouble to establish the facts.”
“That is a dangerous world to live in,” Brodhead declared. “That’s not dangerous for some people; that’s dangerous for all people, and that itself is one of the lessons of the civil rights movement.”
Brodhead, who came to Duke in July, 2004, noted that when the controversy over the alleged rape exploded into the nation’s headlines, Durham Mayor William Bell and North Carolina Central University Chancellor James Ammons, joined him in a united front to call for calm in the community, and patience as the criminal justice system sorted out the details.
He urged that patience again, as the case proceeds towards what many anticipate could be a long and emotionally charged trial.
“In the coming months, we will be put under trial again, and we will have to remember that at that moment of trial, we have the need to protect ourselves and each other’s humanity,” Pres. Brodhead said. “To stand up for the general rights of truth and justice and due process.”
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/news/Article/Article.asp?NewsID=74297&sID=4
This speech would have been useful back in April, but now it sounds like smooth talking CYA. Brodhead still focuses on the case as if it were a racial referendum instead of a criminal proceeding with specific charges. His comments focusing on the "painful history" that this situation "aggravated." Gee, Dick, what if there never were a "situation" but rather a concoction by folks with bad motives? Three Duke students face a combined 100 years in prison based upon lies, and all this guy can say is that we should have a trial before we imprison them. What happens if they are acquitted, Dick? Will you apologize for denying them the opportunity to turn the tables on three innocent men? Strange, byut Brodhead never commented on the policy of Durham to target Duke students for harrassment and false prosecution. I guess profiling is wrong except when disfavored classes are targeted. Only the gauche challenges such matters.
Interesting to note that he received a warm welcome from the NAACP. Brodhead chose the adulation of that path instead of leading Duke University.
I used to think Brodhead was pleasant if bumbling and incompetent. He may be more ruthless and dangerous than that. The best thing Brodhead can do is keep his yap shut until this thing is over.
I wonder why we white folk can't have our Whiteness capitalized as Blacks do......