An officer at Duke Hospital wrote in a report released Friday that the accuser said she was one of four women who danced at the party; every other account of that night says only two women danced.

The woman said that night that five men sexually assaulted her; District Attorney Mike Nifong and investigators have said there were three.

Durham police officer G.D. Sutton noted that the woman also said at one point that she had not been raped. "While being interviewed at Duke, her story changed several times," the officer wrote in a report.

That document was attached to a letter that a defense attorney sent to an investigator in Nifong's office Friday and copied to reporters. The day before, the investigator, Linwood Wilson, interrupted lawyer Joseph B. Cheshire V as he talked at a news conference Thursday after Nifong gave hundreds of pages of evidence to defense attorneys. Wilson asked to see the document that stated the woman had changed her story.

"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 in his letter to Wilson. "I can only assume your motivation in questioning my assertion was simply ignorance. A simple reading of your file might solve that problem in the future."

The letter was another escalation in the continuing public acrimony between Nifong's office and defense attorneys. Cheshire represents David Evans, one of three indicted lacrosse players.

The report, one of 536 pages handed over to the defense at a court hearing Thursday, is another piece of evidence made public by the defense that could cast doubt on the reliability of the woman, an escort service dancer. Her testimony might be the most important part of Nifong's case.

Evidence made public

North Carolina has rarely, if ever, seen criminal evidence spill so rapidly into the public eye. Police reports, handwritten witness statements and reports on photo identification lineups have all become public.

This steady flow is a direct result of a 2004 law that forces prosecutors to share all their evidence with defendants. Lawmakers made the change after several cases in which prosecutors withheld such material, particularly in the case of former death row inmate Alan Gell. Prosecutors withheld statements showing Gell was in jail when the murder occurred.

Under the old law, Cheshire said, "We would get this evidence when the trial started, if at all."

Nifong has said he has always provided the type of evidence now required by law. Efforts to reach Nifong and Wilson failed Friday.

The accuser has been in hiding for months and could not be reached. The News & Observer generally does not identify people who report that they have been sexually assaulted.

Court filings

Nifong has stopped discussing the case, but lawyers representing the three players have stepped up their attacks through court filings that question the accuser's credibility and Nifong's case. The police report, an account of the early morning hours of March 14, adds to the list of apparent problems with the case against the three lacrosse players.

Evans, 23, of Bethesda, Md., Collin Finnerty, 19, of Garden City, N.Y. and Reade Seligmann, 20, of Essex Fells, N.J., each face charges of rape, sexual offense and kidnapping.

The lawyers say that no rape or assault happened at the party and that for at least Seligmann, bank machine photos and the testimony of a cab driver would help show he could not have committed a rape.

Next page >

Get $150+ in coupons in every Sunday N&O. Click here for convenient home delivery.