Trial by NewspaperThe New York Times and the Duke rape case.
Posted Thursday, April 20, 2006, at 7:31 PM ETIn the time-honored institution of trial-by-newspaper, the press collects and examines evidence, obtains testimony, and often issues between-the-lines judgments on the guilt or innocence of the accused months before many high-profile cases go to a jury.
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StumbleUponThe fairness of a trial-by-newspaper, of course, depends on how closely a news organization apes the practices of official courts. Fairness requires it to consider not only the statements and evidence of the accuser, but that of the accused, no matter how heinous the charge. By that measure, the New York Times has failed the two Duke University lacrosse players who were indicted Tuesday of raping a woman during a party in an off-campus house on March 13.
The Times began its coverage of the Duke case on March 29 with a Page One article and has returned to the story almost 20 times since. The Times initially framed the story as one about not only rape but about town-and-gown hostilities in Durham, N.C., about the privilege enjoyed by Duke students, about the thuggish tendencies of lacrosse players, and about race. The accuser is black and attends a nearby state university. All but one of the Duke players is white.
Although it published the blanket denials from the players, avowing that they broke no law the night the woman, an exotic dancer, was hired to entertain, the Times gave shorter shrift to the exculpatory evidence defense lawyers have been piping to news organizations since at least April 8. On that date, the Durham Herald-Sun reported on the Web that Bill Thomas, a lawyer for one of the players who hasn't been charged, said time-stamped photographs of the accuser contradicted her story about being raped, strangled, and beaten by three team members. The Times reported on the photographic alibis in its April 10 edition but did not return to the subject until today, April 20.
Meanwhile, the North Carolina press and cable TV news, most notably MSNBC's The Abrams Report, have relied on the defense lawyers' comments to establish a timeline that casts doubts on the accuser. Last night (April 19), Abrams aired some of the photos after the defense lawyers distributed them. (Abrams graduated from Duke in 1988.)
The Times' migration toward a fair trial began April 11, when it couldn't avoid reporting the defense attorneys' annoucement that the prosecution's DNA tests had failed to link any of the 46 players tested to the woman. Compared to the initial coverage, today's Times story (cited above) reads almost like a brief in support of defendant Reade Seligmann.
Something untoward happened to the accuser on March 13, but exactly what that something is I can't tell from the Times trial of the Duke students. I'm prepared for the prosecution to shred the lacrosse players' evidence and convict one or more of them, but if I were casting my ballot based on the press coverage to date, I couldn't vote guilty.
******
Here's a question I don't have an answer for: The Times has avoided reporting the fact that the dancer was hired from an "escort service," which the Washington Post, the Associated Press, the Raleigh News & Observer, and other many other publications have thought pertinent. What do you think? Send e-mail to . (E-mail may be quoted by name unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)
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Remarks from the Fray:
So, Abrams of MSNBC got it right, or at least less wrong, than the Times? Gosh, I guess I get home too late to catch Abrams, for I certainly hadn't noticed any tendency toward evenhandedness in the coverage of the Duke Lacross scandal on that channel, or anywhere else on cable tv for that matter. O'Reilly, Hardball, Olberman, CNN (whoever that is, these days) - they all rushed to judgment and then backpedalled furiously as soon as the first DNA results came in, a development which curiously Shafer fails to mention.
The Times doesn't appear to have been remarkably ahead or behind the curve on this one. Yet Shafer insists on making the story into a Times meta-scandal (ie, a scandal in the reporting of a scandal). […] All the Times bashing seems a little misplaced, or overdetermined, as if the pundit who can't stop reading it and reflexively howling at it is merely acting out his own bitterness at not seeing his own name on one of its bylines or on its oh-so-august and powerful masthead.
--MarkEHaag
(To reply, click here.)
This is simply put, a great story revolving around a trivial matter. Some scum with family money do something reprehensible to a hooker they bought while drinking - while underage - to incredible excess. Apparently they can do everything illegal except rape without consequences. Now they get accused of rape (always good press, because the he-said, she-said mystery is primal and insoluble), and now maybe something is coming down on them. The shrill, high priced lawyers are out for blood on behalf of these little dipshits, and the media is having fun.
Thank God Jack is policing this beat, while the pretense at journalism on weighty matters goes on all around him....
--certainly
(To reply, click here.)
Once upon a time, feminists rightly railed against the stigma attached to rape, the tendency to blame the victim, and the chilling effect these phenomena exerted on victims' willingness to come forward when assaulted. But I get the impression lately of a u-turn in general tendency. The pattern of trial-by-newspaper is becoming almost routine, which is disgusting in its own right, but this process increasingly seems to proceed from the assumption that the accused is guilty - and to wait until exculpatory evidence reaches critical mass before changing its tone. While the perversion of justice involved when a true rape victim is shamed into silence is extreme, that malefaction is much more so when amplified through the press. Or haven't you noticed the difference between the screaming headline on Day 1 and the page 26B burial of "um...never mind" after the acquittal or wholesale dismissal of charges? This knife cuts both ways - if they are not guilty, the members of this lacrosse team will still be stigmatized just as much as the rape victim who "was asking for it" - unjustly, and with no hope of full repair or recompense.
--Sawbones
(To reply, click here.)
I was actually a little surprised by the tremendous efforts of the NY Times on this story . . . I expected them to be nothing more than the NY Times and predictably lean the way they've always leaned, but in this case, they're really digging their heels in. […]
The lacrosse kids could be damned guilty . . . but, sitting here in front of my computer, I have absolutely no idea who's guilty and of what. The folks at the NY Times don't know either, but it also seems apparent they're not too concerned about what they know or don't know. They're more concerned about putting the case into their preferred social context. […]
It's a shame that the NY Times editorial staff seem to respect their readers as much as the NY Post does (maybe it's a NY thing). At least you know the Post holds their readers (and the truth) in contempt. The Times can't hide behind their name forever.
--mallardsballad
(To reply, click here.)
(4/22)