By Ben Niolet, Staff Writer
DURHAM -- A lawyer for an indicted Duke University lacrosse player fired off a letter today to an investigator for the Durham prosecutor's office, saying that the investigator must not have read the state's rape case file.
After a Thursday court appearance, Joseph B. Cheshire V, a lawyer for player Dave Evans, told reporters that a new batch of evidence contains a police report in which a woman who said she was raped at a team party told police she had been attacked by five men, and not three as authorities have said. Linwood Wilson, who coordinates the prosecutor's worthless check program and works as an investigator, interrupted Cheshire and asked to see the specific document that supports Cheshire's claims.
Today, Cheshire faxed a letter and page 1,304 of the discovery to Wilson.
"Since you are the District Attorney's Investigator, the press could have assumed -- falsely, as it turns out -- that you had actually read your file," Cheshire wrote.
Phone calls to Wilson and Nifong were not immediately returned this morning.
Cheshire wrote in his letter that he was releasing it to reporters because Wilson challenged Cheshire in front of reporters.
Page 1,304 is a narrative written by Durham police officer G.D. Sutton in which he describes his encounter with the accuser at Duke Hospital. The report contains numerous contradictions to the woman's story of what happened at the March 13 party at the house on 610 N. Buchanan Blvd. which was shared by three team captains.
"At Duke, her story changed several times," the officer wrote.
The woman said that she was one of four dancers at the party, when every other report of that night says there were only two. She told the officer that she was assaulted by five men, then said she had not been raped. She has given multiple accounts of how many men she says attacked her.
Nifong has stopped talking about the case, but lawyers representing the three players have stepped up attacks through court filings on the woman's credibility and Nifong's case.