Lawyers for a Duke lacrosse player charged in a drunken brawl in Georgetown have asked to question a prosecutor’s spokeswoman for comments she made to an out-of-town newspaper.
Collin Finnerty’s legal team says that Stephanie Bragg Lee was quoted in several publications saying that “both sides” in the fight last fall “had an equal portion of the discussion” that escalated into a street fight.
Finnerty’s lawyers say this could be an exculpatory statement and, on Monday, said they want to question Bragg Lee about it.
Finnerty, 19, is one of three Duke players to be charged with raping an exotic dancer at an off-campus party. The rape charges got him kicked out of a D.C. first-time offenders’ program, which means he’ll have to stand trial for the Georgetown fight.
Initial police reports said that Finnerty and his friends set upon another young man who was “minding his business.” The reports state that Finnerty and his friends referred to the other man using an epithet for homosexuals.
He’s charged with misdemeanor assault. Asked why the trio hadn’t been charged with a hate crime, Bragg Lee told a newspaper, “Both sides had an equal portion of the discussion, so we felt it wasn’t specifically a hate crime.”
Finnerty’s lawyers say Bragg Lee’s comment goes against the prosecutor’s own version of events.
D.C. Superior Court Judge John H. Bayly, Jr., said he will hear arguments from both sides on Friday.
But Bayly also issued a warning to Finnerty’s team saying that they had to move quickly.
“This is not going to extend for week after week,” Bayly said.
Finnerty’s lawyers had been hoping to postpone his D.C. trial until September. They claimed that his friends — who remain in the first-time offenders program — couldn’t testify on his behalf without fear of incriminating themselves. That argument was short-circuited Monday when prosecutors gave his friends immunity. Also Monday, Bayly excused Finnerty for having missed a curfew call from pre-trial services. Finnerty was out of town on May 4 meeting with his lawyers in the rape case.
