Rush to Judgment

More unsettling is what it says about us. How, in hindsight, could so many so hurriedly have rushed to judgment? How could the presumption of innocence have been treated as a mere formality?

Heaping well-deserved scorn on flame-fanning prosecutor Mike Nifong lets the rest of America off too easy. If stereotyping were a crime, a lot of people would have to plead guilty.

Without supporting evidence, the prosecutor’s case seemed plausible only to the extent that we accepted the stereotype: rich, white kids with a sense of entitlement think they can get away with almost anything—even raping a black stripper (whose word, presumably, no one will believe anyway). Besides, the Duke lacrosse boys already had earned a reputation for loutish behavior.

Apparently, it all seemed reasonable to Nifong. But he served merely as prosecutor. Much of America served as jury. Our 24/7 news machine, the monster we created with an insatiable appetite for content to fill airtime, served to repeat and amplify Nifong’s charges by showing us every item related to the story, from take-back-the-night marches to recitations of one players’ police record.

Meanwhile, those who bought the stereotype, both within and beyond the media, came unexpectedly close to Imus country. For years, Imus and his crew made a living making offensive cracks, going so far as calling the publisher Simon and Schuster “thieving Jews” and African American PBS news correspondent Gwen Ifill a “cleaning lady.”

Sure, said some defenders, it was all politically incorrect—way incorrect—but they were just jokes. In the end, however, whether you accept Imus’ “jokes” as jokes depends on whether you accept any part of the premises underlying them. David Letterman and Jon Stewart can tell “dumb Bush” jokes night after night because the majority of Americans, even some who voted for him twice, at some level seem to accept the notion that our president is several onion rings short of a basket. If W had an 80 percent approval rating, most Americans would find the anti-Bush humor offensive.

Regardless of whether Imus is a genuine racist, does the longtime acceptance of slurs pitched as humor by his audience (many of whom apparently regarded his defamation of Rutgers’ basketball team as just a joke in bad taste) mean that, at some level, they buy into the old canards about Jews, African Americans, women and the rest? I wonder.

I also wonder, a little hopefully, whether the public’s recoil at the injustice to the three Duke lacrosse players will create more sympathy for many more defendants—mostly poor, not rich, and black, not white—whose attorneys allege misconduct by the authorities.

It happens more often than we are comfortable admitting. It has been claimed, with compelling evidence, in at least three prominent death penalty cases here in Tennessee.

Everything that happened to the Duke boys has happened at times to defendants charged with rape and murder. Ambitious or indifferent prosecutors have been known to misrepresent facts. Sometimes, as Nifong did, they refuse to consider all the evidence. Sometimes, they suppress exculpatory evidence, which may not be discovered until years later.

Often, these defendants have criminal records, as one of the Duke players did. So it becomes easier for us to embrace the idea that they’re guilty. And if they didn’t do the crime they’re charged with, no huge deal. They’re bad guys who belong off the street anyway. Right?

That’s why I have only disgust for those who’ve argued publicly that the Duke boys don’t deserve much sympathy. Their families are rich, they say. They were cleared in the end. They’ll be all right. (And what kind of boys hire strippers for parties?)

But they’ll never be quite all right. As one noted, when he dies, no matter what else he does in life, he’ll be remembered as one of the three accused of rape.