I’ve found it hard to write a snarky response that is still subdued enough to post. So let me try another tactic: simply posting the facts.
1. Duke football player Michael Tauiliili led the team in tackles for two years. He was ranked eighth in the ACC last year. This is important to the football team that could not win a game last year.
2. Tauiliili was arrested August 5. He is accused of not stopping after a car accident involving a Creedmoor man (failing to stop at the scene of an accident). He is also accused of having a knife on his person (carrying a concealed weapon), pointing an air gun at the Creedmoor man (assault by pointing a gun), and hitting him in the face so that he required stitches (simple assault).
3a. Tauiliili blew a .12 when a breathalyzer was administered (driving while impaired). The legal limit is .08.
3b. Tauiliili is 20. The legal age to drink is 21. Oops.
3c. All charges except this DWI carry “accused of” or “allegedly” before them. This is not mere happenstance. Arguing about the breathalyzer is like arguing about the radar gun. Even if it is mis-calibrated, there’s no real chance it’s off by .12 (or 12mph–ahem, oops on my part).
3d. Standard Duke policy for DWIs (let alone underage ones) is to suspend students for a semester.
3e. Duke’s Office of Judicial Affairs doesn’t even pretend to respect due process or constitutional rights. (It’s doesn’t have to since Duke is private.) It will consider evidence not admissible in courts and convict on a <100% standard of guilt. In other words, they have to be convinced (hopefully), but not beyond a shadow of a doubt.
4. Tauiliili was “suspended indefinitely” from the team on August 5.
5a. Tauiliili was reinstated to the team on August 16. He will miss the first game of the season and face unnamed “consequences” and meet unspecified “conditions” to stay on as a player.
5b. Last year the Duke Athletic Department canceled a season for pending charges against three members of a team of forty-seven.
5c. Last year Duke University suspended a student for sending a vulgar email.
This brings me to the final fact of the story:
6. The Duke Athletics Department (Joe Alleva) and the Duke University leadership (Richard Brodhead) continue to embarrass the university and its students. Duke doesn’t need to kick Tauiliili out before a formal
investigation, but it shouldn’t be quite so eager to embrace its
wayward son.