• Subscribe
  • Interested Authors
  • Blog
    • All Posts
    • Media Appearance Archives
    • WildBlue Press Author Bios
    • Crime Fiction Books
    • Fantasy Books
    • History Books
    • Horror Books
    • Mystery Books
    • Romance Books
    • Science Fiction Books
    • Thriller Books
    • True Crime Books
  • About Us
    • Catalog
    • Privacy Policy
  • Partners
    • BookBub (author resources)
    • bookshop.org
    • The House Of Mystery with Al Warren
    • ImaginePublicity
    • MacGregor Literary
    • Open Road Media
    • Tantor Media
    • True Crime Uncensored with Burl Barer and Mark Boyer
    • That’s Criminal Podcast with John Stamp
  • Contact Us
    • Acquisitions Team Sign-Up
    • Street Team Sign-Up

WildBlue Press

Great Reads from Exceptional Authors

Great Reads from
Exceptional Authors

  • Home
  • True Crime
  • Thrillers
  • Science Fiction
  • Mystery
  • Horror
  • Fantasy
  • History
  • Business
  • Reader Favorites
    • Award Winners
    • Bestsellers
    • Box Sets
    • Coming Soon
    • New Releases From WildBlue Press

Author Tiddy Smith Discusses Police Misconduct in Durham

Get DEATH BY TALONS
  eBook
Amazon Kindle eBook
  Paperback
Barnes & Noble Trade Paperback Amazon Trade Paperback
  Audio Book
Audible Audio Book

The city of Durham in North Carolina had a serious problem with police misconduct at the beginning of the 21st century. The most famous example was the so-called “Duke Lacrosse” case, which gained worldwide attention. In this case, a young Black woman accused three Duke University students, lacrosse players, of having committed a brutal, racially-motivated gang rape upon her.

The woman’s story about what had happened on the night in question radically changed at least five times in the course of the investigation. Nevertheless, the District Attorney, Mike Nifong, pursued the rape charges against the three white students. Nifong gave dozens of interviews to the media, in which he painted a picture of the young men as racists and perpetrators of a hate crime. He reassured the city of Durham that they would be swiftly brought to justice.

Nifong already knew, however, that a rape kit had been used to test the accuser and it proved that none of the student's DNA was in her anal or pubic regions. The results of these tests were hidden from the students’ lawyers.

Eventually, the truth came out. Nifong was disbarred and found guilty of obstruction of justice. For his outrageous abuse of power, he spent a single day in prison.

Nifong had taken the helm from a man called Jim Hardin, who had resigned from the position of District Attorney in 2005. And in truth, Nifong had inherited a corrupt office. Hardin was the District Attorney who had pushed forward with murder charges in an even more famous case: the murder case against Michael Peterson.

Michael Peterson had been charged with the murder of his wife in 2001 and was found guilty at the end of a lengthy trial in 2003. The case garnered international attention after the release of the Staircase docuseries in 2004 and a related dramatized miniseries in 2022. In Michael’s case, just like the Duke Lacrosse case, there is troubling evidence of both police and prosecutorial misconduct. The two cases stand in parallel because in both cases exculpatory evidence was hidden from the defense.

Importantly, the prosecution had argued that Michael had killed his wife with a fireplace blow poke which had “mysteriously vanished” from the house in the wake of Kathleen’s death. On one of the final days of Michael’s trial, his son Clayton discovered the blow poke leaning against a wall in the basement of the house. The poker was, by now, covered in cobwebs, but it was not dented or bent and it had no blood on it. It was presented at the end of the trial with a grand flourish, to the annoyance of the District Attorney. The discovery of the blow poke made no difference to the outcome, however. Michael was found guilty of Kathleen’s murder and would spend eight years in prison.

But as would become apparent in the years following Michael’s trial, the police forensic team had already found the blow poke, photographed it, and set it back in the basement during a search of the property in 2002. Despite the fact that the State’s case hinged on the mysteriously missing blow poke, no one mentioned the fact that it had already been found, photographed, and disregarded as a possible murder weapon. The evidence was, it seems, deliberately withheld from the defense.

This was not the only example of hidden evidence. In 2003, a neighbor of the Petersons, Larry Pollard, began to promote the idea that an owl may have been responsible for the trident-shaped lacerations that were found on Kathleen’s head. The theory was outrageous and most people felt that Pollard was simply clutching at straws to save his much-beloved neighbor. After all, if a bird was responsible for Kathleen’s death, there should have been feathers at the scene. But no feathers were discovered. Therefore, there was no owl.

Pollard was no idiot. He was an attorney who had previously worked as legal counsel for some of the highest-ranked officials in North Carolina. He had also worked within the Special Prosecutors Office. He knew that if his theory was correct, some evidence of an owl must have been found. So, at the end of 2003, Pollard wrote a letter to District Attorney Jim Hardin asking whether any feathers had been discovered at the crime scene. He received a short letter in reply, which stated that no feathers were found in the course of the investigation.

Because of his previous employment, Pollard had all kinds of contacts within North Carolina’s Special Investigations Division. Through these channels, he received a copy of the forensic trace evidence report. He read through the report line by line.

On page three, he read that a feather had indeed been discovered in Kathleen’s hair. He requested access to the microscopy slide on which the hair was set. With the aid of a microscope, he was able to see that this was not just one feather, but two which had become glued to Kathleen’s hair with her own dry blood.

Durham’s authorities had lied to Larry about the feather. And Durham’s authorities had lied to the defense about the blow poke. They lied about many other facts which would have serious consequences in the case against Michael Peterson. Alongside the Duke Lacrosse case, the Michael Peterson case stands as another example of bad behavior by Durham's police and prosecutors. How was such a culture of corruption allowed to thrive for so many years?

Filed Under: Blog, Tiddy Smith, True Crime Tagged With: cover-up, Crystal Magnum, Duke Lacrosse, Duke University, Durham, Evidence, Fred Rosen, Kathleen Peterson, Media, Michael Peterson, misconduct, Murder, news, North Carolina, police, prison, rape kit, sexual assault
March 8, 2023 By Tiddy Smith Leave a Comment

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

DEATH BY TALONS by Tiddy Smith

Buy DEATH BY TALONS now!

Amazon Kindle eBook  eBook
Hard Cover  Hard Cover
Barnes & Noble Trade Paperback Amazon Trade Paperback  Paperback
Audible Audio Book  Audio Book

INTERNATIONAL KINDLE EBOOKS
USA   UK   Canada   Australia   Germany   France   Spain   Japan   Italy   Brazil   India   Mexico

GET A FREE AUDIBLE AUDIO BOOK

Get this Title for FREE at Audible with a free trialGet this Audible Title for FREE with a 30-day free trial

Hear a sample of the audiobook narrated by Tom Lennon:

WildBluePress · DEATH BY TALONS Audiobook Sample

Listen to Tiddy Smith on True Crime Uncensored

Read More From Tiddy Smith

Featured Image for DBT Gallery

Gallery | DEATH BY TALONS: Did An Owl ‘Murder’ Kathleen Peterson? by Tiddy Smith

Get DEATH BY TALONS   eBook   Paperback   Audio Book DEATH BY TALONS: Did An Owl ‘Murder’ Kathleen Peterson goes beyond the theories and speculations and uncovers the shocking conspiracy surrounding the infamous “Staircase” investigation. In this photo gallery, find the color versions of black and white images contained in the paperback and hardcover copies of the book. […]

Death By Talons Book Cover

Author Tiddy Smith Explores ‘Owl Theory’ and North Carolina’s Infamous ‘Staircase Murder’ in DEATH BY TALONS: Did An Owl ‘Murder’ Kathleen Peterson?

It was not enough to suggest that Kathleen began to bleed outside. It was not enough to point to prior owl attacks on humans. Larry needed a smoking gun. And he would find it. —from DEATH BY TALONS by Tiddy Smith On December 9, 2001, Kathleen Peterson was found dead at the bottom of a […]

Featured Image with owl for new author blog post

A Fatal Owl Attack Has At Least One Historical Precedent, Says Author Tiddy Smith

Get DEATH BY JTALONS The unusual death of Kathleen Peterson in her home in Durham, North Carolina has attracted a tremendous amount of media attention since it occurred in December, 2001. It was first brought to international prominence by Jean-Xavier de Lestrade’s docuseries The Staircase, released in 2004. It was later rereleased in extended form […]

Author Blog Quote "It's not science fiction any more; it's science fact."

Author Tiddy Smith On ‘Jurassic Park’ and ‘The Boys from Brazil’

In 1996, a sheep called Dolly was born. She was the first mammal in history to be cloned from an adult. For this reason, Dolly had three mothers: the one who provided the egg, the one who carried her to term, and the one who provided the DNA. It was a remarkable leap from science […]

Featured Image

Scholar and DEATH BY TALONS Author Tiddy Smith Answers “Who Is Larry Pollard?”

Get DEATH BY JTALONS Thomas Lawrence Pollard, better known as Larry Pollard, was born in Durham, North Carolina in 1948. He was the son of Julia Davis Pollard and Forrest Pollard sr. Studying law at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, he would go on to work in some of the most prestigious legal […]

Author Tiddy Smith Tells Why He Wrote About The Kathleen Peterson Case

Get DEATH BY JTALONS I have always been intrigued by claims of the strange and unusual: Things like ghosts, extraterrestrials, sea monsters and sinister conspiracies. ghosts, extraterrestrials, conspiracy, Ira Levin, Rosemary’s Baby, The Boys from Brazil For this reason, perhaps, my favourite fiction writer was always Ira Levin. I remember reading Rosemary’s Baby for the […]

Tiddy Smith, Author of DEATH BY TALONS, Gives Background Information on The Owl Theory

The Owl Theory and the Michael Peterson Case It was a couple of weeks before Christmas in 2001 when Kathleen Peterson was found dead at the bottom of her Durham, North Carolina property. She had bled terribly from deep slices in her scalp. Her husband, Michael Peterson, claimed that she must have fallen down the […]

Author Tiddy Smith, PhD

Blog Posts by Author Tiddy Smith

Gallery | DEATH BY TALONS: Did An Owl ‘Murder’ Kathleen Peterson? by Tiddy Smith April 6, 2023 Author Tiddy Smith Explores ‘Owl Theory’ and North Carolina’s Infamous ‘Staircase Murder’ in DEATH BY TALONS: Did An Owl ‘Murder’ Kathleen Peterson? March 14, 2023 Author Tiddy Smith Discusses Police Misconduct in Durham March 8, 2023 A Fatal […]

More Posts from this Category

More True Crime From WildBlue Press

In 1978, the bloody conflict in Northern Ireland, known as The Troubles, reached a boiling point. Hundreds of members of the Irish Republican Army, determined to drive the hated British out of the province—killing soldiers and police, detonating bombs, while arming themselves with firearms and explosives—were arrested and incarcerated in a notorious British prison known […]

When widow Frances Lacey was murdered in July 1960 on Mackinac Island, only a few meager clues were found by police, and the case soon turned cold. But more than sixty years later, will those same clues finally solve the mystery? On July 24, 1960, the quaint charm and serenity of Mackinac, nestled between […]

book cover

On February 13, 2017, two Indiana teenagers, Abigail Williams, 13, and Liberty German, 14, went for a walk in the woods near the abandoned Monon High Bridge. They never returned home. Their bodies were discovered on Valentine’s Day morning, sparking a torrent of news coverage and social media speculation that engrossed the attention of people […]

Book Cover

Get STEALING MANHATTAN   eBook   Paperback True crime author, Burl Barer, has always possessed that all-important knack for seeking out hidden truth and finding it. And with Stealing Manhattan, a book that details, as the author proclaims, a “mega-heist” that involved the taking of “over one billion dollars in diamonds, gold, precious gems, and negotiable currency” […]

book cover

Henry Louis Wallace terrorized Charlotte, North Carolina, from May 1992 to March 1994. Wallace preyed on lower economic class Black women between 17 and 35 years old. He knew most of his victims, some through his job at Taco Bell, and gained their trust with his friendly demeanor and gentle nature—concealing a monster fueled by […]

book cover

On an unseasonably warm April evening in 2001, the headless body of a tiny girl was found discarded in a makeshift dump site in the woods on the southeast side of Kansas City, Missouri. One long night turned into four long years for Sgt. David Bernard and the Kansas City Police Department’s 1020 Squad. They […]

book cover

Famous Rock Stars, TV Celebrities, Stone Cold Conmen, A Daring Rescue of Kidnapped Kids, And More! Ready to uncover the truth behind Hollywood’s elite? SECRETS OF A HOLLYWOOD PRIVATE EYE is your ultimate source for the juiciest stories, scandals, and gossip from Tinsel Town. Join private investigator Fred Wolfson on thrilling adventures from the glitz […]

Lou And JonBenet book cover

Now, for the first time in LOU AND JONBENET, Anderson tells the story of Smit’s investigation and why the Smit family team now believes that the killer can be identified.

Genres, Types

New Releases
Featured Books
Coming Soon
Award Winners

Business
History
Horror
Mysteries
Romance
Sci-Fi/Fantasy
Thrillers
True Crime

eBooks
Paperbacks
Audio Books
Box Sets

Available

Biography
• Dances With Donkeys
• Secrets Of A Hollywood Private Eye
• Escape From Mariupol
True Crime
• Grim Paradise
• Above The Ground
• Bad Henry
• The Delphi Murders
• Stealing Manhattan
• Death By Talons
• Lou And Jonbenet
• Hidden Demons
• Love Me To Death
• By The Side Of The Road
• Going Under
• I Don't Like Mondays
• The Last Jewish Gangster, The Middle Years
• The Tuskegee Strangler
• The Decision To Kill
• All Along The Watchtower
• Ted Bundy
• The Last Jewish Gangster, The Early Years
• Carmine And The 13Th Avenue Boys
• Vampires, Gators, And Wackos
• The Curse Of The Turtle
• Deadly Associates
• Jane Doe 9
• Watch Me Die
• Mystery At The Blue Sea Cottage
• The Wheels Of Justice
• 16 Minutes
• Terror Town, Usa
• Raging On
• Grilling Dahmer
• The 'Peyton Place' Murder
• Cold Blooded
• Faith Based Fraud
• The Real Mr. Big
• The Son Of Seven Mothers
• 'The Son Of Sam' And Me
• Serial Killers
• Satin Pumps
• Out Of The Mouths Of Serial Killers
• True Crime Chronicles Volume Two
• The World Encyclopedia Of Serial Killers Volume Three
• The Enigma Of Ted Bundy
• True Crime Chronicles Volume One
• Killing Women
• From The Mob To The Movies
• The World Encyclopedia Of Serial Killers Volume Two
• To Kill Or Be Killed
• No Angels
• Monster
• Under A Full Moon
• 'Til Death Do Us ...'
• The World Encyclopedia Of Serial Killers
• First Degree Rage
• The 'Supreme Gentleman' Killer
• Beast Of New Castle
• The Garden State Parkway Murders
• How Now, Butterfly?
• The Encyclopedia Of The Ted Bundy Murders
• Survival
• Missing ... And Presumed Dead
• Wrong Numbers
• Tantamount
• Playing Dead
• Mothers And Murderers
• Dead Reckoning
• Underworld
• Gabacho
• The Gangster's Cousin
• Race To Justice
• Ted Bundy's Murderous Mysteries
• Travesty Of Justice
• Railroaded
• You Have A Very Soft Voice, Susan
• A Family Business
• Pathological
• Wrecking Crew
• The Last Man Standing
• My Son, The Killer
• Inconvenience Gone
• Toxic Rage
• The Killing Game
• Shots In The Dark
• The Case Of The Golden State Killer
• His Garden
• The Crate
• Burned
• The Case Of The Zodiac Killer
• A Murder In My Hometown
• Bullied To Death
• The Beast I Loved
• Summary Execution
• The Shawcross Letters
• Better Off Dead
• Sidetracked
• My Brother's Keeper
• Targeted
• Held Hostage
• Room 1203
• A Special Kind Of Evil
• Brooklyn's Most Wanted
• Outlaw Los Angeles
• Unsolved No More
• She Is Evil
• The Rise And Fall Of A Casino Mobster
• Outlaw Southwest
• A Clockwork Murder
• Raw Deal
• The Bundy Secrets
• Betrayal In Blue
• The Politics Of Murder
• Murderers Row
• Rough Trade
• Daddy's Little Secret
• Murder In The Family
• Failure Of Justice
• Ice And Bone
• Smooth Talker
• The Trail Of Ted Bundy
• A Taste For Murder
• Sketchcop
• Body Of Proof
• Kentucky Bloodbath
• No Stone Unturned
• Repeat Offender
• Dixie's Last Stand
• Vampire
• Man Overboard
• Bogeyman
• Murderers Row Volume Two
Thriller
• Gasping For Air
• Big Dogs
• The Shadowmaker
• A Nest Of Snakes
• Blood Red Ivory
• No One Will Hear Your Screams
• The Screaming Room
• Bone Thief
• Sword Of The Caliphate
• Last Son Of The War God
• The Strait
• Enemy Of The People
• The Reckoning
• 16 Souls
• Borderland
• Paper Wings
• Lockout
• Pitfall
Mystery
• Deaf Row
• The Humanzee Experiments
• The Killing Machine
• Murder At Mardi Gras
• The Right Thing
• Raven's Ridge
• Raptor's Ridge
• Napa Noir
• Melia Ridge
• Emerald Ridge
• Crevice
• Headlock
• Identity Crisis
• The Obituary
• Naked Addiction
• The Deadline
Horror
• Four
• Acadia Event
• The Red Son
• Highwayman
• The Equinox
• The Pure And The Hated
• Savage Highway
Science Fiction
• Reawakened Worlds
• Tribulations
• Crux
• Leviathan
• Happenstance
• Cain
• Dark Visions
• Hunter
• Created
Fantasy
• Dawn Of Legacy
• Destruction Of Justice
• Blunt Force Magic
History
• Fields Of Fortune
• Legion Rising
• The Korean Crisis
• Tempest Tost
• Saving Sandoval
• Killing Rasputin
Politics
• The (Redacted) Mueller Report
Romance
• When Fall Fades
Business
• Leaderology
• The Age Of Pluralism
• Bamboo Strong
• Corporate Superpower
• Wordpress Websites For Business
• Productivity Tools For Business
Cookbook
• Frank Cullotta's Greatest (Kitchen) Hits

New Releases

book cover

Janzen Robinson Tackles a New Kind of Threat in DAWN OF LEGACY: The Monsters and Men Trilogy, Book Three

Unexpected crucibles, gut-wrenching loss, and time in prison...  The last few years have not been kind to Janzen Robinson. His tenure as the unelected Champion of Cleveland was rough, but it's hard not to catch glimpses of hope as tides of … [More...]

book cover

From True Crime experts, Nic Edwards and Brian Whitney comes THE DELPHI MURDERS: The Quest To Find ‘The Man On The Bridge’

On February 13, 2017, two Indiana teenagers, Abigail Williams, 13, and Liberty German, 14, went for a walk in the woods near the abandoned Monon High Bridge. They never returned home. Their bodies were discovered on Valentine's Day morning, … [More...]

Book Cover

New From Burl Barer with Punch Stanmirovic—STEALING MANHATTAN: The Untold Story of America’s Billion Dollar Gem Heist Masterminds

True crime author, Burl Barer, has always possessed that all-important knack for seeking out hidden truth and finding it.  And with Stealing Manhattan, a book that details, as the author proclaims, a "mega-heist" that involved the taking of … [More...]

book cover

PRECIOUS FEW CLUES: The True Crime Investigation Of Kansas City’s “Precious Doe” Murder

On an unseasonably warm April evening in 2001, the headless body of a tiny girl was found discarded in a makeshift dump site in the woods on the southeast side of Kansas City, Missouri.    One long night turned into four long years for … [More...]

Coming Soon

front cover

From Laurie Winslow Sargent comes REAWAKENED WORLDS: Vintage Dystopian and Sci-fi Stories by a Master Storyteller, John Hayden Howard

STRAIGHT FROM THE AUTHOR'S ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPTS REAWAKENED WORLDS: Vintage Dystopian and Sci-fi Stories by a Master Storyteller is the first volume in a collection of short stories and novelettes by John Hayden Howard (1925-2014), known to fans as … [More...]

ABOVE THE GROUND: A True Story of The Troubles in Northern Ireland—a tale of courage, injustice, and redemption by Dan Lawton

In 1978, the bloody conflict in Northern Ireland, known as The Troubles, reached a boiling point. Hundreds of members of the Irish Republican Army, determined to drive the hated British out of the province-killing soldiers and police, detonating … [More...]

GRIM PARADISE: The Cold Case Search for the Mackinac Island Killer by Rod Sadler—Coming Fall 2023

When widow Frances Lacey was murdered in July 1960 on Mackinac Island, only a few meager clues were found by police, and the case soon turned cold. But more than sixty years later, will those same clues finally solve the mystery? On July 24, 1960, … [More...]

Recent Posts

  • Meet Award-winning Investigative Journalist and True Crime Author M. William Phelps
  • Janzen Robinson Tackles a New Kind of Threat in DAWN OF LEGACY: The Monsters and Men Trilogy, Book Three
  • From Laurie Winslow Sargent comes REAWAKENED WORLDS: Vintage Dystopian and Sci-fi Stories by a Master Storyteller, John Hayden Howard
  • ABOVE THE GROUND: A True Story of The Troubles in Northern Ireland—a tale of courage, injustice, and redemption by Dan Lawton
  • Meet Author Dan Lawton
  • GRIM PARADISE: The Cold Case Search for the Mackinac Island Killer by Rod Sadler—Coming Fall 2023
  • From True Crime experts, Nic Edwards and Brian Whitney comes THE DELPHI MURDERS: The Quest To Find ‘The Man On The Bridge’

Sign Up for Our Newsletter

eZine SignupJoin our email list and be the first to get hot deals, new releases and...
* Author updates
* Free eBooks
* Free audio books
* Enlightening and entertaining posts
* Advance notice of book deals, special offers

Follow Us

Blog Tag Cloud

best true crime books Bogeyman Bradley Nickell Burl Barer Caitlin Rother Cold Case Crime Fiction Crime thriller Detective Detectives Facebook True Crime historical true crime Investigation John Ferak Kevin Sullivan Las Vegas memoir Murder murder book murder mystery Mysteries Mystery mystery thriller Non-Fiction Serial Killer serial killer books Serial Killers Steve Jackson Suspense suspense thriller Ted Bundy Thriller Thriller Books True-crime True Crime truecrime True Crime Authors true crime book true crime books True Crime Original true crimes true crime stories True Murder WildBlue Press writing

Privacy Policy

As Seen On:

Our Authors Have Been Seen On...

Interested Authors Click Here
See Our Entire Catalog
SSL Secure Connection

Copyright © 2023 WildBlue Press. All rights reserved.
Website design by Denver Local SEO Marketing Company
Author Tiddy Smith Discusses Police Misconduct in Durham

Help Us Select A Great Cover

Title Contest

Select the title below that you believe is best. If you provide your name and email address you will be entered into a contest to win a free copy of this title in your chosen format.

*** Submitting your name and email address and verifying the email we send you enters you into a contest to receive a free copy of this title in either paperback, eBook or audio book format.
Loading