The Great Unraveler Strikes Again

Crystal Mangum, March 16, 2006

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Last month, Chicago Sports Review dubbed Professor KC Johnson, “The Great Unraveler” in an article featuring his diligent efforts to expose Durham County District Attorney Mike Nifong’s hijacked Hoax.

"The Great Unraveler

"KC Johnson is a 38-year-old bowtie-wearing Brooklyn College professor with a Harvard degree. He has a passion for American history, and he enjoys the classroom. And due to his own peculiar mixture of annoyance and curiosity, he might be the most oft-cited source for those looking for coverage of what could formerly be called "The Duke Rape Case."

"That it was ever dubbed "The Duke Rape Case" as opposed to "The Duke Investigation" or "Allegations in Durham" is part of why he exists as we know him. He's a common story in New York and Durham. Kurt Andersen has written about Johnson's work in New York Magazine, and calls him "heroic." The exceptional legal writer Stuart Taylor Jr. has written about him in Slate. Many others have, and some will surely follow.

"And yes, old-media lovers, he's a mere blogger; a word that our Microsoft Word still holds in contempt, an underlined outsider. He's also further evidence of how, even inside a newsroom, it's long not been a debate whether the "web logger" has changed modern journalism for the better, no matter how much it can sting us in the old school…To. Print. That.

"The some 1,000 words a day that Johnson has pumped into DurhamWonderland.blogspot.com since last March-and the countless hours of research it has taken-was all spawned by a beef with his peers in the business of educating. The issue was this: he couldn't understand why a massive group of Duke professors, now dubbed "The Group of 88," would come out with an ad in the student paper proclaiming their solidarity with the apparent victim of a rape by members of the Duke lacrosse team, when not only had little evidence been collected, and few articles written, but the accused athletes had yet to state anything in their own defense. Johnson couldn't believe that professors would condemn their own before anyone really knew the truth. And as the truth has come out, and the espisode has thus become a case study in recent legal travesties, Johnson has continued to discuss it all. Mostly on his blog, and seen, in a book."

Today, The Great Unraveler strikes again by producing one of the photographs of hoax-tress Crystal Mangum taken by Durham Police Officer R.A. Reid on March 16, two days after the invented brutal 30 minute "rape". Professor Johnson’s publication of the police photograph further puts to rest malicious misrepresentations put forth by ESPN, The New York Times, Sgt. Mark Gottlieb, Nancy Grace, Travis Mangum, the Snooze Room, and others.

ESPN, April 11, 2006:

A source has provided ESPN with a detailed account of the exotic dancer's arrival at the hospital the night of the alleged sexual assault at a party thrown by members of the Duke men's lacrosse team.

...

The source says the woman entered the hospital well after midnight March 13 wearing a red nightgown and nothing on her feet. She was walking on her own, but there were bruises on her face, neck, and arms.

Duff Wilson, New York Times, August 25, 2006:

Defense lawyers have argued that the written medical reports do not support the charge of rape. But in addition to the nurse's oral description of injuries consistent with the allegation, Sergeant Gottlieb writes that the accuser appeared to be in extreme pain when he interviewed her two and a half days after the incident, and that signs of bruises emerged then as well.

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During that interview, the woman, who is dark skinned, said bruises were beginning to show from the attack. A female officer took photographs and confirmed that ''she had the onset of new bruises present,'' Sergeant Gottlieb wrote.

Nancy Grace with Travis Mangum, CNN, June 15, 2006:

NANCY GRACE, HOST: You said you saw bruises on her face. Where were they?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right up on the eyes and the jaw (INAUDIBLE)

Sergeant Mark Gottlieb, Filling in the Blanks July 2006:

"Tears ran down her face freely and her nose began to run." Gottlieb noted that "the victim stated she had bruising that was beginning to show up from the assault," 60 hours after the party. He ordered Investigator R.A. Reid to take photographs, and noted that "Reid stated she had the onset of new bruises present."

Travis Mangum, repeatedly:

"Well, she (INAUDIBLE) like she was in a lot of pain, and her face was swolled up. She had bruises on her eyes. And she just looked awful, and you look at her, you could tell she had been beaten up." MSNBC

"The father went home and waited for word from his daughter. Later that morning, she came to her parents' house with her boyfriend….After she came home, that's when I knew she had been beaten up," her father said."

Gambling 911

The father of the woman who said she was raped at a party near the Duke University campus said in an interview Tuesday that when he saw her the day after the party, her eyes and face were swollen, her arms were scratched, and she was complaining about her leg. She told him she thought some part of her leg had slipped out of joint, he said. The woman told her father that she had been dancing at a party and that someone had hit her. It wasn't until the next day the woman told her father she had been raped, he said. "I think she was ashamed. ... I just felt numb, angry," the father said. N&O

Brianne Dopart, The Snooze Room, Yesterday:

"While he still believes wholeheartedly his daughter was brutally raped and assaulted on the night of March 13, 2006 -- he recalls in vivid detail his daughter's swollen eyes and cut arms...Something like that, you just can't forget."

Cash Michaels, National Public Radio, April 26, 2006

“Her jaw was swollen. She clearly wasn’t moving properly. She had a problem with
her leg.”

Today’s revelation by Professor Johnson further demonstrates the powerful role blogs have assumed as watchdogs of the old media and public officials.