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Peculiar Duke Motion

By KC Johnson

In a peculiar move, Duke has filed a motion demanding that the Duke Lawsuit site (which contains copies of the civil suit by the unindicted players, as well as links to press coverage) be shut down. The motion claims that the website violates rules against pretrial publicity.Six pages into the motion, however, Duke's attorneys concede that the ethics rule in question "does not address whether creating a website or holding a press conference would be violations." (One would think that the University would have some precedent for such an unusual request.) Moreover, the ethics rules specifically allow attorneys to make public statements countering negative publicity "not initiated by the lawyer or the lawyer's client."Given the copious negative statements by Duke officials and especially by Duke faculty members about the unindicted lacrosse players, it's hard to imagine a clearer example of negative publicity "not initiated by the lawyer or the lawyer's client...continue to full post

Full post as published by Durham-in-Wonderland on February 29, 2008 (boomark / email).