Jean: Is it appropriate practice for a prosecutor to express a personal opinion on whether a crime has been committed?
Goodenow: No, not privately or public. They should never express a personal opinion about a crime. The danger is that it would affect the potential jury pool.
This testimony is really bringing home for laymen how grossly out of line Nifong was during this entire affair.
Says Nifong’s discussion of aiding and abetting and a stone wall of silence was an effort to get “coerced testimony.”
She also points out that prosecutors are not supposed to tell the media who has or hasn’t given a statement in a case. This also is a rule designed to protect the objectivity of a jury pool, she says.
Freedman doesn’t want Nifong’s actual statements to be read. He objects. Williamson allows the statements to be read.
First is the one about why innocent people need an attorney. Goodenow says statement does not comply with rules regarding defendants’ right to an attorney, a constitutional right.
Next, the “what am i doing covering up for a bunch of hooligans.” Goodenow: Implicit in that remark is that he thinks a crime has been committed, and calling a person a hooligan is improper, plus there is no requirement for people to come forward.
Can we get this person to run for DA in Durham? I’d vote for her.
Now, assigning a racial motive to a crime, is that proper? Goodenow: No.
Jean read two Nifong statements citing racial motiviations. Goodenow says neither are appropriate. One assumes a rape occurred and the other is designed to heighten community antipathy to potential suspects, she says.
Jean plays two news video segments. One is from a political forum with his opponent Freda Black. He is being really insufferable in it. Says the case “says something about Durham that I’m not going to let be said: A bunch of lacrosse players from Duke raping a black girl in Durham.”
Goodenow says some of those statements are OK. But talking about lacrosse players raping a woman are inappropriate because they assume guilt, and the race element heightens condemnation of the general public.
