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Other 44 players go back to normal?

May 31, 2006

If you're sitting up late at night unable to sleep because of the Duke lacrosse team rape case, you're a little too invested.

Quick! Turn off the cable news shows. This thing's not supposed to go to trial till next spring -- could make for a whole bunch of sleepless nights.

Thing is, we might expect those guys on the lacrosse team to have some bags under their eyes.

I mean, here's David Evans, who was the captain on the lacrosse team: He graduated on Mother's Day and in less than 24 hours was at the county jail turning himself in on a rape charge.

But that's what can happen when you don't keep your nose clean. Whether or not he's shaved his would-be incriminating mustache in the days since a stripper claimed he attacked her during a party where he was living at 610 N. Buchanan Blvd., the biggest news in Durham would have been Jackie Wagstaff's school board loss had Evans and his homeboys not decided to get their kicks one night in March.

[color="Red"]No drunken orgy, no allegations of rape.

When I was around Evans' age and green and fresh out of college, I was embarking on what would be a miserable 3-month stint as a television reporter at a small station in Birmingham, Ala. But at least I was putting my college degree to work.

No telling when David Evans gets to use his Duke diploma.

Maybe the cynics are right in saying anybody whose mama and daddy can keep them out of jail on a $400,000 bond doesn't have to worry about a job. But what about Evans' teammates Reade Seligmann and Collin Finnerty, the other two dudes indicted? They, too, are free on $400,000 bonds. But they're sophomores, and with this case likely hanging over their heads until 2007, what in the world are they supposed to do?

Now, I'm about like Superior Court Judge Ron Stephens, who told Seligmann's lawyer that his client's case isn't going to get moved ahead of the others on the docket just so he can return to class in the fall without this cloud looming over him. Like I said, this is the kind of stuff that happens when you don't keep your nose clean.

[color="red"]But I have to ask: What if the accuser's lying?

Wait a minute, now! Don't throw a brick at me. The operative word here is "if." I can just as easily ask, "What if the white boys did do it to her?" It cuts both ways.

Figuring cell phone conversations and e-mail messages could be pulled for evidence, I asked lawyer Kirk Osborn what lacrosse team members spend their days doing.

He's defending Seligmann and wouldn't tell me anything.

But Butch Williams, representing a lacrosse player who hasn't been indicted, said his client and the other 44 who haven't been charged are free to resume a normal life.

Which I take as meaning deciding in the coming weeks of spring about returning to Duke for classes in the fall. And if they want to play lacrosse, maybe they go elsewhere, since Duke President Richard Brodhead and the rest of the big dogs haven't said yea or nay about fielding a team for the upcoming season. But there's also the notion of whether it'll do any good for the players to transfer if the curious stares will follow them wherever they go.

Nothing's normal about that.

[color="Red"]The lacrosse boys brought it on themselves, though -- even if the accuser's lying.

John McCann's column appears Sundays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Contact him at jmccann@heraldsun.com or 419-6601.