Chief's take on Duke case tanks

Durham Mayor Bill Bell and council members called the police department's self-review lacking. They want another opinion

DURHAM -- Police Chief Steve Chalmers on Friday defended his department's handling of the Duke lacrosse case, saying his investigators never abdicated responsibility and pursued all investigative leads.

In his first substantial report on the case, Chalmers acknowledged that his investigators botched the crucial lineup that led to indictments of three lacrosse players.

The Friday afternoon police report, however, landed with a thud. Mayor Bill Bell and three council members said they want an outside review of the department's conduct. Bell went so far as to telephone Attorney General Roy Cooper, who dismissed the case in April and declared the three men innocent.

Bell said the police report lacked the answer to a basic question: Who was in charge of the investigation, the police department or District Attorney Mike Nifong?

Councilman Eugene Brown joined Bell and councilmen Thomas Stith and Mike Woodard in backing a third-party probe. "We've been in bed with the mendacities and deception for a year," Brown said. "We need candor."

Bell said he hadn't heard from Cooper. Cooper's office didn't return phone calls to The News & Observer.

City Manager Patrick Baker released two documents Friday afternoon: his memo to City Council members and Chalmers' report.

The reports did not state where final authority lay in the investigation of charges that three players had gang-raped an escort service dancer at a Duke University lacrosse team party at an off-campus house in March 2006.

Chalmers said the investigation was a collaboration between Nifong and police. His assertion conflicted with the report of the senior investigative officer, Sgt. Mark Gottlieb, who wrote that Nifong took over the case on the day news of the lacrosse investigation broke, March 24, 2006.

In his case report, Gottlieb said his supervisor told him to "go through Mr. Nifong for any directions how to conduct matters in this case."

Procedure criticized

Chalmers and Baker devoted much of their reports to explaining the widely criticized April 4 photo-identification procedure that led to indictments in the case.

The procedure, which did not follow department policy, was not an attempt to identify suspects but to locate witnesses, Baker and Chalmers concluded.

The accuser, Crystal Gail Mangum, had viewed photographs of 36 lacrosse players in March and not identified any assailants. So police, at Nifong's suggestion, showed Mangum photographs of the 46 white members of the team. Mangum had said all the attackers were white.

"This decision to attempt to identify witnesses rather than suspects was driven primarily by the fact that the witness had failed to identify her attackers in six previous suspect identification processes which were governed by" police policy, Baker wrote.

Police did not expect Mangum to name assailants during the April 4 procedure, Chalmers wrote.

But Mangum picked out four as her assailants. Police went to a Durham County grand jury and obtained indictments for three: Dave Evans, Reade Seligmann and Collin Finnerty.

Chalmers' explanation came under immediate fire from council members and lawyers.

"If your alleged victim starts identifying suspects, then why do you let her continue, particularly if you know, as well you should, that this probably won't be allowed in court?" Brown asked.

Police had officially named all 46 players as suspects in court filings. And if the procedure was a search for witnesses, police failed to include photos of three other people who attended the party: the team's lone black player and two neighbors not on the team.