Alibi photos for lacrosse players questioned

[alarcojon]

Photographs the defense for the Duke lacrosse team planned to use as evidence that there was no alleged rape at a party could be a hindrance, Time magazine reported.

Taxi driver Moez Mostafa told the magazine that he saw exotic dance Kim Roberts exchange angry words with lacrosse players, enter an "old white car" and speed away from the scene. Mostafa, cited as an alibi witness for the accused lacrosse players, told Time magazine that he didn't want to be seen "on the side of the defense only. I want to look like I’m an honest person."

He told Time that he picked up accused player Reade Seligmann and another unknown player at the party at house at 12:19 a.m. on the morning of March 14. He told investigators that he dropped the pair off at 12:40 a.m. at a dorm on campus, after making several stops. Mostafa said he returned to the house at 12:50 a.m. to pick up four more players, whose identities are unknown, around the same time he claims to have seen Kim Roberts get into the white car.

Using his statement, prosecutors will probably attack the defense's claim that the alibis for the accused players — the series of allegedly time-stamped photos taken by players the night of the party — aren't what they seem. Seligmann, 20, and teammate Collin Finnerty, 19, have been charged with rape in the case.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12521096/

[ugarte]

1. Apparently not the first time she's been raped by 3 men

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2006/more/04/27/duke.lacrosse.ap/index.html?cnn=yes

[Lindacooks]

15. So? Your point is?

Many women have been victims of rape more than once. Do you think there's some 'magic' whereby if you've been raped once, you're exempt for life? There's no 'get out of jail free' card for victims of violence, especially sexual violence.

Grow up.

[ugarte]

18. And your point is?

I said apparently it wasn't the first time she had been raped by 3 men. What part of that statement do you disagree with?

[Lindacooks]

20. My point is that is not relevant to this case. The ONLY relevant

issue is if she gave consent.

[cantstandbush]

17. She was only 14 then. My God. What are you implying? n/t

[ugarte]

19. I'm not implying anything, but obviously you are

I said apparently it wasn't the first time she had been raped by 3 men. What part of that statement do you disagree with?

[Kingshakabobo]

2. I don't see how this affects his credibility?

There are phone logs, phone records and the cabbie's story matches ATM receipts? No?

What am I missing here?

The interesting argument will be over the photo of the victim in "the old dark-colored car" and whether she was coming or going. According to the Time reporter, the prosecution's case will hinge on the assertion that she was arriving @ 12:40am when the photo was snapped. That theory seems kind of desperate to me since she is being helped in to the car, minus a shoe....the same shoe she is missing in one of the other, supposedly, post crime photos. When Dan Abrams pointed out the shoe discrepancy, the Time reporter seemed surprised-I found that funny.

[Igel]

3. I'd be more concerned with the phrase

"I want to look like I’m an honest person."

If he values honor above accuracy, all bets are off as to his credibility. If the defense catches this, then it's all up to the physical evidence, time-stamps, and the like.

[ElsewheresDaughter]

4. wrong the cabie said she got into a white car...the photos shows a black

car....and it is questionable that the dates were photoshopped onto the photos admitted by the defense as eviedence

[djg21]

5. I don't buy the "photoshop" theory

No reputable attorney would risk being convicted of falsifying evidence and obstructing justice, and of being disbarred, in order to get a criminal defendant off the hook. When the photos are offered at trial, they have to be authenticated. If they were somehow altered, you can bet that the prosecution will offer expert testimony to that effect and the photos can be discounted by the jury or excluded by the judge.

IME, once a jury learns that a litigant has attempted to offer demonstrably false testimony or evidence, it is disinclined to believe anything else that person says. Why would an attorney put his client in this position?

[ElsewheresDaughter]

16. maybe the attorney does't know and the college students did it

[BrownOak]

24. The defense lawyers aren't that stupid

Anytime you photoshop an image you leave a trace. Guys like Wade Smith and Joe Cheshire aren't going to put their reputations at risk by using photos without checking them first for signs of tampering. Plus, I believe the time stamps to which they refer are those in the metafile, not the dates printed on the picture.

[Kingshakabobo]

7. Correct. The cabbie said "white" car and the photo says "dark" car.

I know that. That's why I don't put much stock in un-corroborated eyewitness testimony. That said, doesn't his story match all the other corroboration? ...the ATM and phone records? IIRC, he has a phone log? I would imagine they can match them against cell-phone records. If all those match, then remembering the wrong car color seems insignificant?

No? Am I missing something?

[superconnected]

6. so the photographs from the party are now said to be doctored.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12521096/

"The photos in question was taken, defense sources say, at approximately 12:41 a.m. and shows the accuser calmly being helped into a car to leave the party. Along with other time-stamped photos from earlier in the evening, defense attorneys will claim that there wasn't enough time for a rape to take place.

But prosecutors will argue, that photo actually shows the accuser being dropped off at the party, not leaving it, and that it was taken well before midnight. Prints taken from digital cell phone cameras have time stamps, but can be altered, digital photography experts told Time. Only the cameras themselves have true embedding time date to correspond with photos taken. "

[Kingshakabobo]

8. You posted the same link that is in the OP.

edit to add: "that is"

[superconnected]

12. what's "op"?

[Kingshakabobo]

14. Original Post. n/t

[Kingshakabobo]

11. Being dropped off minus the same shoe that was left behind at the scene?

It doesn't add up?

She is missing a shoe in the photo were she is SUPPOSEDLY being helped out of the car.

[brentspeak]

9. Does Time Magazine normally report details on a rape investigation?

This whole thing is already a circus.

[superconnected]

13. Yes, bingo! Circus.

[Placebo]

22. God bless American media!

:spank:

[gratuitous]

10. The camera owner had better be rock solid

I know that the time on a digital camera can be set and reset with relative ease. Every time I have to re-charge the batteries, I have to reset the time on my camera, and setting it to the wrong time is virtually untraceable.

Also, there is the question of the recent switch from Standard to Daylight Saving Time. If the person who owns the camera that took the pictures didn't reset the camera to DST, the time stamps on the photos will be off by one hour; the photos might establish an alibi for one hour before the alleged rape, but not one for the actual time surrounding the alleged rape.

But I'm sure all the attorneys involved have already thought of that, and eliminated those possibilities . . .

[Placebo]

21. INNOCENT UNTIL PROVEN GUILTY.

[Exiled in America]

25. That's true for the jury, as a matter of legal structure. We however --

Are free to form whatever opinions we see fit, based on our interpretation of the information.

Personally, I suspend judgement totally - neither labeling them innocent or guilty for now.

[Placebo]

26. And everyone needs to remember that...

none of this really matters.

It's a huge distractionary tactic being used by the MSM.

Don't take the bait people! This is a local matter, not something any of us should be concerning ourselves with.

[FredScuttle]

23. Well, the defense team didn't hold a press conference or leak this out

so it can't possibly be true. :sarcasm:

[Joseph Christ]

27. Lets just remember...

...that in this Country we have people be innocent until proven guilty. And why is that? Because people lie. Everyone is capable of it. I don't care if your a man, woman or both. People can lie and people do. People can try and wreck lives and people do. It is for that reason that we, at the very least, attempt to have the safeguard in place of a fiar legal practice and system.

Look up how many people have been released from prison after serving 10-25 years for crimes they did not commit now that DNA evidence is able to be checked.

[rocktivity]

28. This reminds me of a story I saw on Court TV

about a man whose alibi in a murder was that he was fishing on a lake--and he had a time-stamped video to prove it. By measuring the length and angles of the shadows that were cast in the video, the forensics folks were able tell the prosecutor that the video had been shot hours earlier that day!

:headbang:
rocknation