CORRECTION

A front-page story Sunday misspelled the first name of a Durham police investigator. Her name is Michele Soucie.

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CORRECTION

This report on the Durham lacrosse case Sunday contained an error involving the timing of a discussion between District Attorney Mike Nifong and Investigator Michelle Soucie.

On April 4, Nifong instructed Soucie to nail down what the accuser in the case had done on the day prior to the alleged rape. That was nearly two weeks before the first two indictments in the case.

This error changes the implication of the first five paragraphs of the story: that the conversation between Nifong and Soucie was an example of the words and actions of police and prosecutors outpacing the facts in the file.

The error does not affect the accuracy of the remainder of the story, which reported gaps between the prosecution's words and its evidence.

We regret this error.

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DURHAM -- Investigator Michelle Soucie of the Durham Police Department was working the phones the afternoon of April 17, trying to set up DNA tests on evidence in the Duke lacrosse case. A private laboratory in Burlington gave a price, and Soucie immediately contacted District Attorney Mike Nifong.

It had been an eventful day for Durham's lead law-enforcement official: A few hours earlier, a gaggle of television cameras and reporters had trailed Nifong around the sixth floor of the courthouse. A grand jury had charged two Duke University lacrosse players with gang-raping an escort service dancer. The players would be arrested at dawn the next day.

Nifong took the quotes on the DNA-test prices from Soucie and gave the officer further marching orders.

"Mike Nifong stated that: Also need documentation on escort service and how they do business," she wrote in her notes. "Need to nail down what victim did on the day before arriving at 610 N. Buchanan so we can show that she did not receive trauma prior to the incident -- with witnesses."

Nifong had brought charges in the most publicized case in Durham County history. He had said repeatedly on national television that he was certain the dancer had been raped. Yet the prosecutor was still trying to rule out other explanations for the vaginal swelling a hospital noted in its examination of the accuser.

The words and actions of police and prosecutors had outpaced the facts in the file, and not for the first time. The case, which began at a college team party on a warm March evening, quickly drew national attention to Duke, Durham and to North Carolina's justice system -- even as the prosecutor's version started to unravel.

In examining the files Nifong has produced in the case, The News & Observer found that the accuser gave at least five different versions of the alleged assault to different police and medical interviewers and made shaky identifications of suspects. To get warrants, police made statements that weren't supported by information in their files.

The district attorney commented publicly about the strength of the medical evidence before he had seen it. He promised DNA evidence that has not materialized. He suggested that police conduct lineups in a way that conflicted with department policy.

Nifong and other parties involved in the case declined to comment because of an order from Superior Court Judge Kenneth C. Titus. The News & Observer does not identify people who file complaints of sexual assault, and the accuser could not be reached for comment.

Much of the district attorney's evidence is contained in more than 1,800 pages of documents he has made available to the defense under a recent state law requiring prosecutors to open their files before trial. Those documents are only part of the evidence that could be introduced in a criminal trial. They do not include information still being gathered or testimony that might occur under oath.

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