Mike Nifong
Michael Byron Nifong is a disbarred American prosecutor who formerly served as the Durham County District Attorney. He was removed from this position, disbarred, and jailed following court findings concerning his conduct in the Duke lacrosse case, primarily his conspiring with the DNA lab director to withhold exculpatory DNA evidence that would have acquitted the defendants.
Early life
Nifong was born in Wilmington, North Carolina, and attended New Hanover High School. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1971 with a degree in political science. He registered as a conscientious objector and participated in anti-war protests during the Vietnam War. After working as a teacher and social worker, Nifong returned to UNC in 1975 and earned a J.D. degree from the University of North Carolina School of Law in 1978. He was admitted to the North Carolina bar.Career
After spending a year as a per diem assistant with the Durham County District Attorney's office, Nifong was hired on a full-time basis in 1979. He eventually worked his way up to chief assistant. Nifong was part of the prosecution team during the Michael Peterson trial. After District Attorney Jim Hardin was appointed to a North Carolina Superior Court vacancy in 2005, Governor Mike Easley appointed Nifong to fill out the remainder of Hardin's term. Nifong was sworn in on April 27, 2005. As the Duke lacrosse case unfolded, Nifong won the Democratic primary on May 2, 2006 for Durham County District Attorney. He won the general election in November 2006 by a margin of only 833 votes.Duke lacrosse case
In 2006, Nifong pursued rape, sexual assault, and kidnapping charges against Reade Seligmann, Collin Finnerty, and David Evans, three white members of the Duke University men's lacrosse team. The accusation of sexual assault was made by Crystal Mangum, one of two local black women who the lacrosse team had hired to work as strippers for a party. The case attracted national and international media attention. Former New York Times public editor Daniel Okrent wrote, the case "conformed too well to too many preconceived notions of too many in the press: white over black, rich over poor, athletes over non-athletes, men over women, educated over non-educated."In the first weeks of the case, Nifong gave an estimated 50 to 70 interviews. On the day he received his first briefing by police, March 27, 2006, he told the press, "The circumstances of the rape indicated a deep racial motivation for some of the things that were done." By April 1, he had made 48 statements to the press, including assertions that others present at the party where the alleged assault took place were covering for the accused players, saying, "I would like to think that somebody who was not in the bathroom has the human decency to call up and say, 'What am I doing covering up for a bunch of hooligans?'" Initial media reports on the case largely reflected Nifong's statements and opinions.
Nifong said in a court hearing on October 27, six months after the arrest of Seligmann, Finnerty, and Evans, that he had not yet interviewed the alleged victim. "I haven't talked with her about the facts of that night...We're not at that stage yet." According to Nifong, none of his assistants had discussed the case with her, either.
On December 22, 2006, Nifong dropped the rape charge against the men after Mangum changed her story, saying that she was no longer certain whether she was penetrated vaginally by any of the men. This was a few days after it was revealed in court that Nifong had withheld evidence from the defense concerning DNA tests. Nifong was strongly criticized for pressing ahead with what appeared to many to be a weak case without any physical evidence. The defense argued that Mangum had given at least a dozen different accounts of the incident, changing the number of attackers from twenty to three, and modifying the methods by which she was assaulted.
In January 2007, Nifong sent a letter to then-North Carolina Attorney General Roy A. Cooper, asking his office to assume responsibility of the case. This came days after Mangum changed her story again, claiming that Seligmann was not involved in the alleged attack. Previously she had accused him and two others of the alleged rape.
The next day, Cooper announced that his office would take over the case. In April, he announced that charges against the three players would be dropped and that "based on the significant inconsistencies between the evidence and the various accounts given by the accusing witness, we believe these three individuals are innocent of these charges".
In December 2024, Mangum stated in a letter that she lied about her accusations against Evans, Finnerty, and Seligmann and wanted to publicly apologize for her actions. She further admitted, during a December 11, 2024 podcast interview, that she "made up a story that wasn't true" about the white lacrosse players who attended a party where she was hired to be a stripper.
Criticism
Defense lawyers and media outlets were strongly critical of Nifong's handling of the case. Nifong said that the criticisms were the product of a defense strategy to malign the prosecution and intimidate the alleged rape victim.As the details of the case emerged, Nifong was attacked not only by advocates of the indicted students but by news sources such as The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times. They claimed he went public with a series of accusations that later turned out to be untrue; that he exaggerated and intensified racial tensions; that he unduly influenced the Durham police investigation; that he tried to manipulate potential witnesses; that he refused to hear exculpatory evidence before indictment; that regulations on the conduct of an identification exercise were breached by a failure to include "dummy" photographs of anyone who was not at the party; that he had never spoken directly to the alleged victim about the accusations; and that he made misleadingly incomplete presentations of various aspects of the evidence in the case, including DNA results.
Additional coverage critical of the prosecution's case included that expressed by 60 Minutes, the Charlotte Observer, Fox News, the Greensboro News & Record, National Journal, the Newark Star-Ledger, The News & Observer, Newsweek, the New York Daily News, New York magazine, the San Diego Union Tribune, Washington Times, The Star-News , and the now-defunct Rocky Mountain News.
Nifong gave more than 50 interviews, many with the national media, according to his own account and confirmed by the News & Observer. In these interviews, Nifong repeatedly said that he was "confident" that a rape occurred, calling the players "a bunch of hooligans" whose "daddies could buy them expensive lawyers." From early April 2006, however, Nifong generally refused to talk to the media.
On July 18, 2006, defense lawyers charged that Nifong made "unprofessional and discourteous" remarks. During a preliminary hearing, Nifong said, " attorneys were almost disappointed that their clients didn't get indicted so they could be a part of this spectacle here in Durham." One lawyer asserted that "Nifong's statement is an insult to the legal profession as a whole and is certainly unwarranted by any facts in this case." Others saw it as a personal insult. Nifong then went on vacation and could not be reached for further comment.
On October 27, 2006, Nifong said in court that neither he nor his assistants had yet discussed the alleged assault with the accuser, saying they had so far left that aspect of the investigation to the police.
Critics of the district attorney requested that Nifong be investigated, punished and disbarred for his actions in this case. On December 12, 2006, Republican Representative Walter B. Jones of North Carolina's 3rd district was reported to have sent a letter to U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales asking for an investigation into whether Nifong committed "prosecutorial misconduct" and violated the civil rights of the three suspects in the case; Gonzales stated that his office might investigate how Nifong had handled the case. Critics noted that police were instructed to "Go through Mr. Nifong for any directions as to how to conduct matters in this case." This was an unusual move for a prosecutor to order.
On December 16, 2006, it was revealed that Nifong and DNA lab director Brian Meehan conspired to withhold exculpatory DNA evidence from the final report submitted to the defense team.
The prosecution of the case was criticized by the legal analyst for the National Journal, Stuart Taylor, as well as New York Times columnists David Brooks and Nicholas Kristof. An investigation by CBS' 60 Minutes "reveal disturbing facts about the conduct of the police and the district attorney, and raise serious concerns." This 60 Minutes segment was honored with a Peabody Award on April 4, 2007. Several writers at Slate criticized the prosecution's actions and especially criticized the mainstream media for accepting prosecution claims at face value in spite of countervailing evidence.
Because Nifong failed to turn over exculpatory evidence to defense lawyers on December 22, 2006, The News & Observer wrote that "to press forward in the case, District Attorney Mike Nifong must rely on scanty evidence while deflecting serious questions about whether he broke the law or violated the ethics rules governing prosecutors."
Thomas Sowell accused Nifong of using the case to improve his chances in the next election by gaining large support from the African American community. Nifong ultimately won the primary and general election in the midst of the case, despite the fact that allegations of ethical improprieties had already come to light. A federal judge in 2011 ruled that a civil lawsuit could proceed against Nifong, including claims of malicious prosecution and fabrication of false evidence.