At The N&O, we're accustomed to having folks saying unpleasant things about us. Most of the time, we just smile, let it pass. Occasionally, we have to admit that the caller or letter writer is correct.

We try to draw the line when someone falsely accuses us of illegal behavior.

That's what Durham District Attorney Tracey Cline has done, repeatedly, in her legal battle against Superior Court Judge Orlando Hudson. In her most recent court filing, Cline again says, in a sworn affidavit, that reporter Andrew Curliss was held in contempt of court in Durham in 1998.

In her affidavit, trying to disqualify Hudson from hearing a criminal case, Cline assembles her version of what happened to Curliss after his jailhouse interview with Derrick Allen in 1998:

"By this time, I knew that this reporter and the Raleigh News and Observer had a vested interest in the Allen case; in that in 1998 Curliss was held in Contempt of Court for refusing to follow a Court Order to provide the notes of an interview with Allen."

Let me say this as simply as I can: That is false. Not true. Didn't happen.

Here's what did happen: Curliss interviewed Allen, who was in jail after being accused of sexual assault and murder of a 2-year-old girl. He wrote a story about it. Durham prosecutors were interested in anything else Allen said, and they subpoenaed Curliss' notes.

The N&O did resist this subpoena. But we ended up submitting the notes for Hudson to review. Hudson ordered the notes turned over, but stayed his order while we appealed. Curliss was never called to testify, and he was not cited for contempt. Not in this case, not in any other case.

We have tried to point this out in news stories, but Cline doesn't seem to be getting the message. So today, I mailed (and e-mailed) a letter to her. It simply asks her to correct the court record and stop saying what isn't true.

Cline is angry that Hudson has dismissed charges against several high-profile defendants in Durham, some of them because of prosecutorial misconduct. Cline believes, incorrectly, that we have somehow conspired against her with Hudson and defense lawyers to compile our stories that have shown that she has withheld exculpatory evidence from defendants and made repeated misstatements in court. Now, while complaining about our work and Hudson's, she has made another one.

Since this misstatement involves us, we'd like to set the record straight. We trust that Cline will, too.

--Steve Riley, Senior Editor/Investigations

A lawyer for convicted murderer Angel Richardson argues in a new court filing that the state's position is "ludicrous" and "inane" in suggesting that his lawyers could have uncovered information favorable to him prior to trial.

The case from Durham was a part of a recent series in The News & Observer in which questions about prosecutions by District Attorney Tracey Cline are under review in the court system.

In the case of Richardson, one of the issues was that a gang underboss had given a statement to a Durham police officer that implicated someone else in the crime. The officer was also working on a federal task force and had not provided the statement to Richardson's defense that another man claimed the killing for which Richardson was charged.

Richardson is seeking a new trial, saying that the statement came out at the end of his trial and rendered his defense ineffective.

The statement to the police says that a man named Lemeul Sherman had claimed the killing.

Police arrested Sherman after the killing, and he cut a deal with police and fingered Richardson.

The state, in fighting Richardson's appeal, said in a court filing that Richardson's lawyers could have located that same information that was in the statement by talking directly with Sherman.

Richardson this week responded.

"The suggestion that the defense would have obtained the exclupatory information that Sherman admitted that he was the one that killed Marlon Rand is ludicrous," the brief by Chapel Hill lawyer Ann Petersen says. "Sherman was charged with accessory after the fact in exchange for providing the name of the person he claimed was the one that shot and killed Marlon Rand. He named Defendant Richardson. ... To suggest that Sherman would have told defense counsel what he told (the gang underboss), that he, Sherman, was the one that committed the murder, is inane."

The full brief is attached to this post.

Read previous material on the Richardson case by clicking on this sentence.

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