DA: 'This case is not going away'

DURHAM -- The district attorney said at an N.C. Central University forum today that there are additional DNA tests to be done in the investigation of a reported rape at a party attended by Duke University lacrosse team players.

One day after lawyers representing the team's players held a press conference to say state DNA testing exonerates the players and helps prove that no rape occurred, District Attorney Mike Nifong said at the forum that all of the DNA tests are not in and that the woman who said she was raped in a bathroom by three men can identify her attackers.

Nifong's comments, the most he has said about the case in more than a week, seemed to contradict the lawyers' assertions that there is no evidence that a crime occurred.

"I assure you by my presence here that this case is not over," Nifong said as NCCU students and community residents questioned him about the case.

The panel featured Durham's mayor, a city councilman and representatives of student governments from Duke and NCCU, where the accuser is a student.

Nifong said that the woman was able last week to identify at least one of the men she says attacked her at a March 13 party at a house shared by three of the team's captains.

In response to a question asked by an NCCU criminal justice student, Nifong said the DNA tests are not finished.

"We're still waiting for the results of DNA tests that have not been done," he said.

State Bureau of Investigation experts faxed a report to Nifong on Monday. That testing, defense lawyers said, compared evidence taken from the woman and from the house to cheek swabs of all but one member of the team. Neither Nifong nor the lawyers released the report, but on the steps of the courthouse Monday, the lawyers said the report supports the team's story, that two women hired to dance at the spring break party took $800 and left after performing for just a few minutes.

The woman told police that she and the other dancer left the house after the men began making what she thought were threatening comments. She went back into the house, she told police, and was raped, sodomized, beaten and robbed by three men. The woman is black and she says she was raped by white men. The investigation has drawn national media attention and touched off debates and protests.