Customer Reviews

It's Not About the Truth: The Untold Story of the Duke Lacrosse Rape Case and the Lives It Shattered

5 star:		(30)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

"It's Not About the Truth" by the former head coach of the Duke lacrosse team, Mike Pressler, is an engrossing and enlightening read.

I thought that I had paid attention throughout the process, and still learned a great deal and picked up some keen insights.

The book chronicles the events from the phone call to escort service up to declaration of "innocent" and the start of the 2007 lacrosse season.

Major and bit players in the drama are profiled and their actions recounted in a documentary/narrative style that is easy to follow and comprehend.

The University bureaucrats (starting with President Brodhead) showed no profiles in courage and abandoned the team, its season and Coach Pressler in a show of politically correct CYA.

The AD is revealed as a cowardly marionette whose word was not his bond.

The 88 faculty members (20% of the Duke staff) who took out a full-page "social disaster" ad in the student newspaper openly flew their agenda flag. A huge rush to judgment before the facts were known.

As egregiously as the university acted in forsaking the team and coach, the actions of the DA (Mike Nifong) and the Durham PD were enough to prompt two ethics charges from the North Carolina State Bar. Trial starts this week.

Nifong's rush to judgment was motivated by his desire to be elected in the 2006 DA race.

The book points out that he never spoke to the escort (complainant) until about eight months after the supposed incident.

The book does show where the profiles in courage reside.

Ironically, it is James Ammons (Chancellor at the historically black college NCCU), who was the initial public voice of reason...being the first to say "don't rush to judgment."

Coach Pressler and his family proved to be a rock of stability in all the turmoil for the team. After speaking with the Senior Captains, he knew they were speaking the truth...and never wavered in this belief.

While the AD was not supportive, the other coaches were loyal to the lacrosse team.

The legal team was incredible. Joseph Chesire V said he knew after three minutes that Dave Evans was telling the truth, and proceeded accordingly.

The members of the team and their parents are the real heroes. The anguish and anxiety they all suffered waiting for the third indictment had to be excruciating. Lives were turned upside down for over a year.

They banded together and never lost faith in one another. That not one underclassman transferred showed a great leap of faith to a university that did not show the same loyalty.

It took a lot of bravery, trust and faith for the parents to send their sons back to Duke.

"The Truth" kept their resolve intact.

Anyone who saw the address Dave Evans gave on May 15, 2006 knew he was speaking from the heart and meant every word he said. It was a powerful moment.

If you watched him speak and did not know he was truthful you should not play poker, as every tell was there.

There are some of us who never vacillated in believing in the innocence of the team. I still feel apologies are owed by many to Coach Pressler, the defendants, the team and the parents.

I was half expecting to read very familiar stuff when I got this book. I was amazed at how much new material this book presented and how much I could not put it down. This is a wonderfully written book that stays with you long after you read it. Just be prepared to be glued to the pages from the moment you open this new classic of judicial literature.

Coach Pressler's descriptions of this event recalls the Salem Witch trials. It is amazing something like this could happen nowadays and the fact we all lived through it makes it even more interesting. This is written in such a personal and fluid style that time just ceases to exist when you open this book. There is so much details that will leave you shocked that you really feel as if you are living the case and also feel joy at how justice was eventually done. Sadly, Coach Pressler lost his job but history will recall him as a wonderful coach and person while others such as the Duke administrators (including the Duke President)and Durham Legal and Police depts will be forever linked with a despicable period in legal history. Long after we are all gone their names will still live in infamy. It they have a conscience they would feel shamed.

I recommend as highly as I have ever recommended a book.

Books about contemporary events can be potboilers. It's Not About the Truth is absolutely not in that category!

Author Don Yaeger has formidable credentials. He is a former associate editor of Sports Illustrated, the author of seven books, co-author of the New York Times bestseller, Under the Tarnished Dome, and the critically acclaimed Pros and Cons: The Criminals Who Play in the NFL. His honesty, expertise, skills, and perception are highly significant in a crisis in which those attributes have been and are so often missing.

Yaeger's style is clear, revealing in both detail and perspective, consistently lively, producing a story hard to put down. He states his opinions as well as rendering them through detailed reporting, a considerable amount either missed or not available before even in Durham.

The very extensive interviews from many differing angles and his work with Coach Mike Pressler are especially valuable, often strikingly to the point. Coach Pressler kept a diary from the first days of the drama. These sources are very extensive, exciting to read, and illuminate the events from innumerable directions, often of strategic value.

The Duke Lacrosse Case, although a media phenomenon, is by no means a new aspect of institutional life, here and elsewhere, whatever the endeavor. This story shines another powerful beam upon management style and mentality, and how some, far too many, regard the groups and individuals subject to their power. A foxhole attitude, refusal to acknowledge mistakes, and a callous disregard for individuals and groups, however valuable their contributions have been and could be, are widespread. Here one thinks of Lee Iacocca's Where Have All the Leaders Gone?

This corrosive situation is exactly why the media and the whistleblowers are so necessary. How else would we know? Messrs. Yaeger and Pressler deserve our esteem and congratulations. Coach Pressler, the Duke

Lacrosse Team, and their families and lawyers are class acts.

Just when you thought that you knew everything about the Duke University Lacrosse Rape Case, here comes a new book that shows just how little you really knew about it all.

There are several things about the case that did not make the headlines but which explains just what a shocking case of injustice this really was.

*The book explains why the man who the Duke Lacrosse team resent most is not District Attorney Nifong, but instead university President Brodhead.

*The book shows how a black student named Nartey sent threatening emails to team coach Pressler and not only was never punished for it, but was actually rewarded with a seat on a prestigious committee. Meanwhile, a white student named McFadyen sent some joke emails about to case to a private group of friends and wound up being suspended from the university.
In other words, different strokes for different folks.

*The book exposes the shameful practices of the Durham Police Department.

*The book exposes the shameful conduct of a group of college professors known as the "Group of 88" who went out of their way to inflame the situation and make wildly false accusations against the Lacrosse team members.

An added bonus to this book is an open letter by Coach Mike Pressler's 15 year old daughter Janet addressed to university president Brodhead that is a stunning indictment of Brodhead's conduct during the case.

If there is any book that you absolutely, positively have to read this year, then this is the one.

Don Yaeger did an excellent job researching the Duke Case and exposing the fraud. Sadly, neither of the black strippers have been held accountable for their actions.

Sexual abuse--seems to be the new "Witch Hunt" in America where just being accused destroys one's life and the accusers go unpunished when they have been proven liars.

Worse yet--were the 88 professors who broke every rule of a liberal by not only prejudging the three young men--but putting it in writing. I cannot see how Duke can keep that group employed. How can they TEACH impartially after having played their cards so openly prejudiced?

Well done Yaeger!

This is a great book. It tells a compelling story. Chances are that you know some of the story. Indeed, you couldn't avoid it if you read a newspaper or had cable television access in the past year. I thought I knew the story, but I did not know the half of it until I read the book. Unfortunately, the facts and the eventual outcome are sure to depress you.

As for myself, I knew right away that the Duke lacrosse case was a hoax. Ok, I wasn't one hundred percent positive. However, I was 99% sure.
Why? Two reasons. First, this whole tale ideally fit the template of victimhood and oppression that the media and university professors adhere to like a religion, and it allowed them to recklessly push their radical social agenda. Secondly, I know Mike Pressler and his character.

I know Mike from being a college football teammate at Washington and Lee over twenty years ago. Mike had the good fortune of playing for two head coaches in lacrosse and football that were good coaches but even better men. Mike spent eight seasons with Jack Emmer (lacrosse) and Gary Fallon (football) and was captain of both sports. He learned at the foot of two of the finest gentlemen I have ever met. In my mind, there was no way that Mike was defending those kids if they were truly guilty of a heinous crime like rape. I am not saying that Mike is or was a choirboy, but I always respected Mike tremendously. To borrow a Coach Fallonism, if I was stuck in a foxhole, I would be glad to have him next to me. After reading the book, would you want Richard Brodhead or Joe Alleva in your foxhole?

As for the role of the professors and the media. Both deserve ridicule and shame. It is now well known that Mike Nifong is a prevaricating piece of trash. However, he had willing accomplices to aid and abet his capricious actions. The behavior of the 88 professors who signed on to the "we're listening" ad is reprehensible. How many have apologized for convicting these young men before knowing the facts? If they were really listening, some might have the humility to say a simple "I'm sorry". Don't hold your breath. The ad should have read, "we're promoting a radical agenda". And, as for the media, they breathlessly reported how these rich white boys attacked a poor defenseless single mom. Not true, oh well, they were rich and deserved the abuse anyway.

I don't want to spoil the text of the tale for those will read the book. I highly recommend you do.

In the end, the results are what bother me:
President Richard Brodhead- You are the antithesis of a leader. A man with virtually no courage. Yet, you will continue to lead one of the finest universities in the nation.
AD Joe Alleva- You are as spineless as a jellyfish. Yet, you will continue to prosper as AD of Duke. Hold tightly to Coach K's coattails!
The gang of 88- As a group, you are totally wrapped up in your left wing radical agenda. In this case, you raised rabble, created a ruckus, brought unbelievably negative attention to your fine institution. And, when proven wrong, you uttered not a word of apology. Congratulations on setting a fine example for the youth you are charged to educate.
Mike Pressler- Forced to resign from his job, move from his home and uproot his family.
Finnerty, Seligmann, Evans and families- Your lives were almost ruined. What a miscarriage of justice that you were indicted. Thankfully, you were never wrongfully convicted.
The rest of the 2006 team- You lost the chance to compete for the 2006 national championship. The seniors lost their last season and many lost lucrative, well-deserved job offers.

Duke is a school that has pined to be "Ivy League". Years ago, I read a book Poisoned Ivy, by Benjamin Hart. The book chronicled how a radical left faculty and administration at Dartmouth had affected life on campus for the student body. With the likes of Brodhead and the gang of 88, it looks like Duke is as poisoned as any "Ivy League" school.

The "elite" educators of Duke could learn a lot from some of the parents of the Duke players (look for vignettes on Patricia Dowd and Lincoln Payton) that they let down so grandly. Perhaps the Duke alums (and alums of many fine schools with similarly dysfunctional faculties)should stop writing checks for a while.

I am giving this book 5 stars because of its importance. It is not as well written as Stuart Taylor, Jr., and KC Johnson's UNTIL PROVEN INNOCENT, but it contains a good chronology of events and contains much more on Mike Pressler and his family. It's awkward at some points to have Don Yeager as the teller instead of Pressler. Some readers will regret Mike Pressler did not have the time and money to expand his own diary of the events in the Duke lacrosse case as a separate book; I would have paid more to have the actual diary printed here. Nevertheless, this is a very important book. It's most valuable for the portrait of the Presslers. Unless Sue Pressler writes her own book, we may never have a more powerful depiction of the splendid American family, the Presslers, including the daughters. One of the treasures of this book is the letter fifteen year old Janet Pressler wrote to Richard Brodhead on 24 March 2007. Poignantly she tells the President of Duke University, "I would have liked this letter to be one in which I described your heroism in your loyalty, leadership, and decisions during the events of last March [2006], but it didn't turn out that way. The lives of my family and the lives of hundreds of others involved in the Duke lacrosse were irrevocably changed because of decisions made by you and your staff. In the end, our sacrifice made no positive difference. No apology or promise can restore the lives we led last year." Any reader will rejoice at the portrait of a great, loving, honorable American family. Mike and Sue Pressler--what a pair!
The Duke case is a great national story of a rogue prosecutor and his minions, of the rogue mainstream media (who can watch Nancy Grace now without loathing her? or trust the New York Times?), of a racist sexist tenured faculty leaping to precisely the wrong conclusions about victimization in the name of political correctness, of a hapless and ultimately conscienceless university president, Richard Brodhead, whose name on Google is linked forever with the words "pandering," "weak-kneed," "cowardly," "craven," "contemptible," and "rush to [the wrong] judgment." As NEWSWEEK said on 10 September 2007, "Brodhead and Nifong had an almost willful disregard for the facts." "Almost" is charitable. Brodhead said that "the facts kept changing" (p. 210); but as a senior, William Wolcott, says, "Hey, facts don't change. The truth doesn't change." What Brodhead and the Gang of 88 did "was bad enough," in Brodhead's memorable words, but the Gang has gained greater power on committees at Duke, and Brodhead seems set to pass his third year review.
The most optimistic news in this book, as in the Taylor-Johnson book, is the potential power for good in a new twenty-first century resource, the bloggers. Blog-hooligans, the politically correct Duke professor Cathy Davidson called them. The bloggers, having not only more brains than the Duke Gang of 88 but a robust capacity for humor, seized on the insult as a badge of honor. Blog-hooligans for the Truth! Finally, what this book celebrates is an old-fashioned American sense of humor, decency, friendship, loyalty, love. It's wonderful to see at least a few people behaving like, well, like heroes, like the Americans Ken Burns is portraying right now on PBS.

I have, when I was a graduate student, had my own contact with administration highjinks so I was eager to read this book. What became clear is not the standard understanding that district attorney Nifong was dishonest which we already know, but the dgree to which president of Duke Broadhead behaved with a complete lack of honor or integrity. In one example in the book an administrator, who had a responsibility to protect these students, lied to them by saying that there was an administration/student priviledge and that they could tell him anything without fear that it would be repeated. This was clearly an early attempt to throw these students to the wolves as a way of showing the institution's distance from them, and was meant to get the school off the hook at the players' expense.
Whatever settlement these students received from Duke, anything less than 8 figures was too little.

This book is well written, making it a quick easy read, and hard to put down. The chapters are well organized, beginning with the incident of the Duke lacrosse team having the party, hiring the stripper, and soon taking off to introduce the list of people who tried to shape the outcome to fit their twisted agendas.

Stephen Miller, a student columnists for Duke's Chronicle puts it best, "...the people turned it from an issue about a specific charge about a specific situation into an all-out class and race and gender warfare" (pg 161).

It's frustrating to know that we're so quick to find the worst in each other. Perhaps it's the media. Perhaps it's the times. Perhaps it's human fallibility. But when the moment presented itself for those in a position to do so, so few people stood up to do the right thing and defend these boys. What's worse, these were adults who were looked up to - the faculty, school officials, and those in the justice system (from cops to district attorneys).

Mike Pressler (co-author and former coach of the Duke Lacrosse Team), says in conclusion, "Not many can claim to have stuck together when the truth wasn't popular," he said, "But they, like me and my family, always believed that those two words - the truth - would one day win out." (pg 280).

Chapters:
1. The Perfect Storm
2. Don't Worry, This Will Blow Over
3. Duke and Durham
4. Lacrosse at Duke
5. The Strippers
6. The Cops
7. I-I and Done
8. Blue Wall of Silence
9. Who is Mike Nifong?
10. Press Hound
11. The President
12. Perfect Offenders, Perfect Victim
13. Agendas All Around
14. The Media
15. "It's Not About the Truth Anymore"
16. No Match
17. Politics of Race
18. All In
19. Crumbling Case
20. Summer Camp
21. General Election
22. "No Penetration"
23. "Yu Can't Make Me"
24. Cruelest of Ironies
25. Duke Lacrosse 2007
26. Exonerated
27. Moving On

Timeline of Events
The Cast of Characters

I thought I followed the Duke Lacrosse case fairly closely. But Yaeger goes much deeper into why this whole thing blew up. It wasn't just Mike Nifong who was a bad guy. This book also tells the story of an institution (Duke University) full of cowards in its administrations and self serving over-the-top left wing professors. The one thing that nobody cared about were the ideals of innocent until proven guilty and due process. At Duke University, those aren't important and the lives that were trampled over were not important to Duke. What is most amazing to me after reading this book is the lack of remorse shown by so many people who behaved poorly. If this story were a John Grisham fiction book, it would still be a good read. But it's true and Don Yaeger does a nice job of providing a background to the characters and institution.