College Shorts Imus scandal, Duke lacrosse

Author: H.Kay Merriman

Rutgers' profile surges after Imus scandal

After radio show host Don Imus's reference to the predominantly black Rutgers women's basketball team as "nappy-headed hos," the team's coach and players have been commended for their cordial response to the insult. As a result, sale of Rutgers' merchandise is also up 30 percent.

Media coverage of Rutgers' response, in addition to that of the recent success of their football and basketball teams, has given the university unprecedented national attention.

"You can't pay for publicity like this," said Shalonda Tanner, a Rutgers alumna and recruiter on CNN. "The class and dignity of these women brings more positive publicity to us."

Although the team did not take action against Imus, CBS fired him and MSNBC dropped their simulcast of his show.

-CNN.com



Accused Duke lacrosse players exonerated

On April 11, North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper announced that all charges of sexual offense and kidnapping against Duke lacrosse players Reade Seligmann, David Evans and Collin Finnerty were dropped. The players had been charged with raping a hired dancer at a March 2006 party. The case was fraught with racism implications and commentary on racial and social stereotypes.

The formerly accused are now calling for a reform of the justice system. Seligmann, Evans and Finnerty have filed ethics complaints against Michael Nifong, the Durham County district attorney who had been working on the case.

"There were many points in this case where caution would have served justice better than bravado, and in the rush to condemn a community and a state, [Nifong] lost the ability to see clearly," said Cooper on CNN, who took over the case for Nifong after his resignation in January.

The players have complained that Nifong misrepresented the credibility of the students and the evidence their lawyers presented, and that he withheld DNA evidence from the players' lawyers.

The players' lawyers have announced their intent to sue Nifong, but not to sue the woman who accused them of the assault.

-CNN.com



Dred Scott reenactment tackles judicial ethics

Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer assisted Harvard Law School students in reenacting the 1857 U.S. Supreme Court ruling of the Dred Scott decision last week. The case, originally presided over by Chief Justice Roger B. Taney, heightened antebellum racial tensions when it declared that no black, whether a slave or a free man, could ever become a U.S. citizen.

"This is an enduring lesson for judges, including, of course, justices of our Supreme Court, to be humble, because Chief Justice Taney was anything but humble," said former Whitewater prosecutor Kenneth Starr in a CNN report.

According to CNN, Taney's decision showed complete disregard for the Declaration of Independence's statement that "all men are created equal." The dramatization was intended to encourage the future lawyers to question the legal and ethical responsibilities of the court.

"For me it immediately raises the question as a judge," according to Breyer on CNN. "How do you talk to other judges and persuade them about matters where you really think they're going to do something quite wrong?"

-CNN.com