Rams future QB situation?

[Boffo97]

He didn't jump on a table. That's the media running with a story rather than checking facts. He said it while on the stairs of the student union with friends.

Yes, you get it. So since you seem to get it, go ahead and make your thread demanding the Rams cut Janoris Jenkins, Jo-Lonn Dunbar, Robert Quinn, and Trumaine Johnson. After all, being good at football clearly doesn't minimize immature and criminal behavior off the field. You shouldn't want them on our team.

Or does your standard not apply to everyone? Is it okay to minimize bad behavior for certain players and not others?

Which one of them was accused of rape?

 

[jrry32]

Which one of them was accused of rape?

Yea, I'm not going to go around in this circle again.

However, I find it a bit odd that being accused of (but not charged or arrested for) rape is worse than being arrested for a DUI or fighting/resisting arrest.

That all said, never doubt the media's influence. I'm not going to argue over the rape allegations again. There's plenty in this thread already showing the limited facts from both parties...and they paint a picture that is far from clear as to what happened that night and whether the girl is being honest or not.

 

[Mackeyser]

This part I find hilarious. I've heard it's pretty complex but after seeing it on the field for 3 years now, I have no idea why it's so complex. I'm pretty sure opposing DC's have it figured out after the first two or three drives.

It's both. The O is difficult for the players to run, but not so difficult to foul up. Think sports car... difficult to run... not so difficult to foul up... one thing breaks, the whole damn things needs to be towed to the shop...

damn, that analogy was closer than I imagined. And when this O does get going, we sure do go from 0-60 about as fast as any team in the league...

Yeah, I think we need an OC who's more in line with Consumer Reports... I want a RED SOLID CIRCLE (that's the good one, right?). No half circles or any of that mess... quality control, consistency and reliability...

 

[Mackeyser]

Okay... I just can't stand it anymore.

This is BS. This isn't even just civil discourse. This is ONE GUY necro-humping an accused rapist.

She had two bits of sperm in her underwear? Well, maybe she had consensual sex with her damned boyfriend and then she was freakin' RAPED!

Oh, and I swear... <delete rant> stop with her "changed stories" bit. I said it multiple times that her account is ENTIRELY CONSISTENT with Rohypnol poisoning. And that would explain why her account differed from her friends' accounts. Now, she supposedly tested negative for "drugs", but most tox screens don't freakin test for Rohypnol and their derivatives.

So, and I'll just be blunt, this necro-hump of Jameis Winston is disingenuous, tired and amoral. Yep, amoral. Winning at any cost? Even if it means abetting a rapist? Funny, I posted about Brady maybe becoming a Ram and a bunch of guys said they'd leave before they'd root for a cheater. Pretty sure rape is worse than cheating. Even more were opposed to Vick when he got out of prison. It matters who our players are and, no, that doesn't mean the have to be Spags' 4 pillars guys, but pretty sure Rapists can be checked off the list...

You say you read the NYT article. Did you? Did you read the part where the investigating officer also worked in his off hours for the FSU booster association? You know, the association with $150M in assets that pays 25% of the University Presidents salary and would be very tied into the needs of the University first?

So, you're not going to admit the massive conflict of interest for this cop? Then you're going to use his report that would make a writer for the Onion blush as PROOF? That's ballsy, man, truly.

I hope whoever gets him....chokes on him. I will NEVER root for that dood and if he ever becomes a Ram, that's the day I'm done as a fan. Done.

Now, to answer the inevitable rebuttal, yes, other players have done things. Leonard Little killed a woman during a DUI. His remorse was palpable. HE wasn't sure if he should ever play again and he tried his entire career to reach out to the family to make amends, but the family was understandably bitter and refused. Peyton Manning did, in fact, sit on that trainer's face. However, if asked about that, he's very upfront about how embarrassed he is about his behavior. Favre played more continuous games at QB than any QB in the history of the game... so he did something right. But, yeah, I think I read in an interview that he regretted not preparing better (though that's hardly a felony like rape or sexual battery or vehicular homicide).

I really hope we win just a few more games... because as long as we draft 7th or below, there will be at LEAST 2 teams that NEED a franchise QB and I'm certain that one of them will take Winston in the top 3 picks so all of this will just be moot and I can just pray that if Winston ever tries that again (the better hope is that he doesn't, but I have no faith in that), he's caught like Darren Sharper.

 

[dieterbrock]

Which one of them was accused of rape?

Doesn't matter. Winston is that good. What obvious as a pattern of character issue is irrelevant. Because he can sure throw that football

 

[jrry32]

Oh, and I swear... <delete rant> stop with her "changed stories" bit. I said it multiple times that her account is ENTIRELY CONSISTENT with Rohypnol poisoning. And that would explain why her account differed from her friends' accounts. Now, she supposedly tested negative for "drugs", but most tox screens don't freakin test for Rohypnol and their derivatives.

No, I'm not going to stop with that. Just because you want to ignore a key piece of evidence that cuts against your conclusion that he's guilty isn't going to influence me to do it.

The toxicology screen came up negative. Does that mean your theory is incorrect? No. But it does mean that your theory can't be substantiated and is based entirely on YOUR OPINION. Your opinion isn't fact. I can very easily create a theory in the opposite direction...or another theory that he's guilty. Theories are not hard to create with limited facts when you're allowed to fill in the blanks with your own opinion.

Can't deal with conflicting opinions, don't post on the subject.

You say you read the NYT article. Did you? Did you read the part where the investigating officer also worked in his off hours for the FSU booster association? You know, the association with $150M in assets that pays 25% of the University Presidents salary and would be very tied into the needs of the University first?

So, you're not going to admit the massive conflict of interest for this cop? Then you're going to use his report that would make a writer for the Onion blush as PROOF? That's ballsy, man, truly.

I did read the article. I bet a lot of the TPD cops work to someone tangentially related to FSU when doing off duty gigs. Seems like a tenuous claim. He's not investigating the booster association.

I do find it funny that we're supposed to throw out the police report, Winston's opinions, the opinions of Winston's roommates, and only listen to the girl's story. That's certainly one way of convincing yourself that your opinion is correct. Just throwing out every piece of evidence to the contrary based on any justification you can find. But that's not critical thinking. That's confirming your own biases.

Now, to answer the inevitable rebuttal, yes, other players have done things. Leonard Little killed a woman during a DUI. His remorse was palpable. HE wasn't sure if he should ever play again and he tried his entire career to reach out to the family to make amends, but the family was understandably bitter and refused. Peyton Manning did, in fact, sit on that trainer's face. However, if asked about that, he's very upfront about how embarrassed he is about his behavior.

I'm going to stop you here. Leonard Little was arrested for a DUI a few years after killing that woman. That sure shows remorse.

Peyton Manning lied about the incident and years later, wrong a book again lying about the incident. Yea, that sure shows remorse.

 

[Dieter the Brock]

Jamarcus is available

 

[moklerman]

Jrry32, something to consider is how little we hear about most of these guys. I'm sure they've all done things that have been covered up and none of them are choir boys and they're all young men bound to make mistakes. And, if you look at how valuable they are as commodities if they're any good, there are teams of people who's job it is to keep them clean in the media.

So, when something does get out, it's probably not the only time something's actually happened. Peyton probably pulled lots of pranks and did immature things and they were kept quiet for example. So, if you're with me on that line of thinking, isn't a bit disconcerting to consider just how much has come out about Winston?

You've done your best to rationalize it all but "all" is the point. The guy has serious character concerns for anyone that's impartial. Maybe if I watched him play all the time or went to FSU or whatever I could get sucked into what he can do on the field but it's very difficult to buy into the idea that Winston has just been the victim of a SERIES of misrepresented situations. You know, where there's smoke, there's usually fire?

But I'm not trying to sway you, just explain a point of view. You've stated your motivation as different than mine so I don't see how we could see eye-to-eye on this subject. You did ask about whether it's okay for some players to have checkered backgrounds and others to not?

I would say that it is different. Because I don't think anyone agrees that a 4-pillars approach is attainable or even realistic. No one is asking for every player to have led perfect lives. But the QB of the team is different than the backup gunner on special teams, wouldn't you say? The investment, commitment and responsibility to the franchise is always topped by the QB position. So, that position is held to a different standard and expectation than all the other positions.

So, while I don't think anyone is lobbying to have a thug on the team, if there's one at DT or CB or whatever, that can be absorbed to some degree. But QB is a different animal completely. Potentially drafting Winston reminds me of how I felt about the Tony Banks era of Rams football.

But, you are right. If the Rams draft him and he's better than Luck, Newton and all the rest, the fans will quickly forget his off the field stuff. And he hasn't actually, definitively crossed any point of no return with the stuff he's done like committing murder and being caught but the red flags are there. When you couple that with the uncertainty that comes with every QB transitioning from college to the NFL, he is not what I want the Rams to do. Starting over and rebuilding around that guy would be a huge risk and one that would lead me to cancel my NFL Sunday Ticket for the first time in 15 years.

 

[Boffo97]

I'm going to stop you here. Leonard Little was arrested for a DUI a few years after killing that woman. That sure shows remorse.

You mean that arrest where he was acquitted? And it was shown that the arresting officer was just gung ho on nailing everyone on DUI?

Yeah, how dare he.

In any event, the more I hear, the more I'm glad it's very unlikely Winston will be a Ram. No matter how talented he looks now, he screams character bust waiting to happen.

 

[Yamahopper]

Jamarcus is available

View attachment 3852

If we ran a 3-4 he's my nose tackle for sure.

 

[jrry32]

Jrry32, something to consider is how little we hear about most of these guys. I'm sure they've all done things that have been covered up and none of them are choir boys and they're all young men bound to make mistakes. And, if you look at how valuable they are as commodities if they're any good, there are teams of people who's job it is to keep them clean in the media.

So, when something does get out, it's probably not the only time something's actually happened. Peyton probably pulled lots of pranks and did immature things and they were kept quiet for example. So, if you're with me on that line of thinking, isn't a bit disconcerting to consider just how much has come out about Winston?

Not necessarily. It's called opening the flood gates. When the accuser's lawyer went to the media, it opened the flood gates on Winston. Every single thing he did was going to be scrutinized after that rape allegation went public.

In addition, being a Heisman and National Championship winning QB as a freshman is already going to put you under a microscope.

You've done your best to rationalize it all but "all" is the point. The guy has serious character concerns for anyone that's impartial. Maybe if I watched him play all the time or went to FSU or whatever I could get sucked into what he can do on the field but it's very difficult to buy into the idea that Winston has just been the victim of a SERIES of misrepresented situations. You know, where there's smoke, there's usually fire?

I'm not "rationalizing it". The guy does not have serious character concerns for anyone that's "impartial". As I've said all along, the crux of his character concerns for me is the rape allegation. I don't know what happened, the facts are not at all clear, and because of this, I will not draw conclusions. The other stuff is minor and fairly meaningless to me.

If you want to take the stance that I am biased and trying to rationalize this because I'm a fan, I have interesting news for you. I GO TO THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA. I despise the Seminoles. So no, there's not bias here. I looked at the facts from an objective POV on the rape allegation and what I found is that there was insufficient evidence to support a conclusion towards guilt or innocence. It'll be up to the NFL teams to investigate that. I can't.

Your opinion is not the only impartial, objective, correct point of view. It's your opinion just like mine. I have a different point of view that comes from a lot of research into all of this. Research conducted as a person with no emotional connection to Winston beyond thinking he's a great player on the field. There are plenty of people here that don't like Winston and think he's a great player on the field...so clearly you can remain "impartial" even if you think he's a great player.

But I'm not trying to sway you, just explain a point of view. You've stated your motivation as different than mine so I don't see how we could see eye-to-eye on this subject. You did ask about whether it's okay for some players to have checkered backgrounds and others to not?

I would say that it is different. Because I don't think anyone agrees that a 4-pillars approach is attainable or even realistic. No one is asking for every player to have led perfect lives. But the QB of the team is different than the backup gunner on special teams, wouldn't you say? The investment, commitment and responsibility to the franchise is always topped by the QB position. So, that position is held to a different standard and expectation than all the other positions.

No, I just don't think it's different. I want a QB that can lead my team to victories. I'll happily take a guy like Roethlisberger or Favre who might get bad press if they can help my team win. As far as arrests off the field, I don't want that happening with my backup gunner or my QB. So I'm going to do my best to see if a guy's issues are maturity related that he can overcome or if he actually is a problem child. That's...if I could. Which I can't. But we're speaking theoretically I assume.

So, while I don't think anyone is lobbying to have a thug on the team, if there's one at DT or CB or whatever, that can be absorbed to some degree. But QB is a different animal completely. Potentially drafting Winston reminds me of how I felt about the Tony Banks era of Rams football.

I'd take a thug if he can keep his shit together off the field and in the locker-room. This is football. You need players with a mean streak.

But, you are right. If the Rams draft him and he's better than Luck, Newton and all the rest, the fans will quickly forget his off the field stuff. And he hasn't actually, definitively crossed any point of no return with the stuff he's done like committing murder and being caught but the red flags are there. When you couple that with the uncertainty that comes with every QB transitioning from college to the NFL, he is not what I want the Rams to do. Starting over and rebuilding around that guy would be a huge risk and one that would lead me to cancel my NFL Sunday Ticket for the first time in 15 years.

I understand your stance. I just differ on how much of a risk I think he is. That's where the disagreement lies.

You mean that arrest where he was acquitted? And it was shown that the arresting officer was just gung ho on nailing everyone on DUI?

Yeah, how dare he.

In any event, the more I hear, the more I'm glad it's very unlikely Winston will be a Ram. No matter how talented he looks now, he screams character bust waiting to happen.

Wait...you mean a guy has to be convicted for the allegation to be credible...? Interesting. So the Prosecutor declining to press charges against Winston...

 

[Boffo97]

Wait...you mean a guy has to be convicted for the allegation to be credible...? Interesting. So the Prosecutor declining to press charges against Winston...

If he was tried and acquitted, that's far, far more convincing than charges not being filed. Especially since it really seems the local "authorities" are sweeping anything about Winston under the carpet.

Apples and oranges... and honestly, this is going to be a lot of effort for a guy that isn't going to be a Ram anyway.

 

[jrry32]

If he was tried and acquitted, that's far, far more convincing than charges not being filed. Especially since it really seems the local "authorities" are sweeping anything about Winston under the carpet.

Apples and oranges... and honestly, this is going to be a lot of effort for a guy that isn't going to be a Ram anyway.

It's not quite apples and oranges. The reason you can blame for Winston not being charged(police misconduct) is the same reason why Little was acquitted. The police officer didn't follow procedure. Little failed multiple sobriety tests, admitted he had been drinking, smelled of alcohol, etc. He got off because of the police officer's errors in investigating that.

So if you want to say that Winston wasn't charged because the police bungled the case...the same is true of Little being acquitted.

I also take issue with the statement that it's far more convincing for him to be acquitted than not have charges filed. Disagree. The standard for filing charges is far lower than the standard for convicting. If the prosecutor declined to file charges, it likely means that he felt he could not win or he felt the charge would not be sustained in court. Which means that the prosecutor in Little's case must have felt he had an opportunity to win and obviously had enough evidence to sustain the charges.

If they don't have the evidence for a charge, that speaks volumes. Could he still be guilty? Sure. They just can't prove it. Then again, the same is true even if you are acquitted.

I think the better argument...which would go towards the apples and oranges claim you made...is that rape is a lot harder to prove than a DUI.

 

[blue4]

The severity of the crime must be considered. DUI with a fatality is something that 90% of the world's drivers could have been convicted of at one part of their lives, if their luck didn't hold. Wedding receptions, young man out with a few girls, 3 beers turns into 8 before you realize it. It's a horrible crime, but ultimately one of awful judgment. There's no accidental rape. You don't say "Whoops, looks like I might have raped this chick. Man, what was I thinking?" The problem stems from the fact that the police, Winston's roommates, and Winston himself have a vested interest in this going away. If I murdered someone and my two best friends told the cop I didn't do it, they would approach that with skepticism. And rightfully so. If I was accused of sexual assault, and a potential employer knew who I was he would not hire me. It may not be fair, but it is protecting the company assets. I don't want a HC who thinks he can "mature" a potential rapist, I want a HC who lets him go to Oakland. Right now it's at least 50-50 that he did it. It may now be fair in the grand scheme of justice to hold that against him, but it's reality.

 

[blue4]

I don't know why people think everyone was okay with Little's problems. I thought it was totally classless and horribly disrespectful to the woman's family that the Rams and the NFL allowed Little to play after the 2nd incident. That no longer shows bad judgment, it shows intent to commit a crime. I thought it was a black eye to the Rams organization to protect him for that.

 

[Boffo97]

The police officer didn't follow procedure. Little failed multiple sobriety tests, admitted he had been drinking, smelled of alcohol, etc. He got off because of the police officer's errors in investigating that.

It was a lot more than that... but this is an argument that's going nowhere over a person who won't be a Ram anyway.

If I'm wrong about that, I'll evaluate things then, but even morality aside, he'd be a terrible choice for a coach on the hot seat to bring in.

 

[Memento]

Honestly? I hate Little for what he did. I hate Vick for what he did. But their crimes pale in comparison to rape, which, in my honest opinion, is the worst kind of evil that you can inflict upon a human being. Yes, even worse than murder. As horrible as killing someone is, they don't feel any more pain when they're dead. With rape, it's the exact opposite; the victim literally suffers every day for the rest of their lives.

I don't want a rapist on the team. I don't even want to take a chance on someone who was accused of rape. And for said person to be a quarterback? The face of the franchise? No.

 

[lockdnram21]

Honestly? I hate Little for what he did. I hate Vick for what he did. But their crimes pale in comparison to rape, which, in my honest opinion, is the worst kind of evil that you can inflict upon a human being. Yes, even worse than murder. As horrible as killing someone is, they don't feel any more pain when they're dead. With rape, it's the exact opposite; the victim literally suffers every day for the rest of their lives.

I don't want a rapist on the team. I don't even want to take a chance on someone who was accused of rape. And for said person to be a quarterback? The face of the franchise? No.

Well I'm glad your not in charge. Because I hope we get Winston

 

[LesBaker]

OK, i've watched the plays, and they're all crazy good. now, you can read this article. and if you can honestly say that you still feel good about campaigning for this person, well...i don't know what to say.
484

A Star Player Accused, and a Flawed Rape Investigation
By WALT BOGDANICH

April 16, 2014

Florida State University students at Potbelly’s, where a student had been drinking on the night she said she was raped. Leslye Davis/The New York Times

Tallahassee, Fla. — Early on the morning of Dec. 7, 2012, a freshman at Florida State University reported that she had been raped by a stranger somewhere off campus after a night of drinking at a popular Tallahassee bar called Potbelly’s.

As she gave her account to the police, several bruises began to appear, indicating recent trauma. Tests would later find semen on her underwear.

For nearly a year, the events of that evening remained a well-kept secret until the woman’s allegations burst into the open, roiling the university and threatening a prized asset: Jameis Winston, one of the marquee names of college football.

Three weeks after Mr. Winston was publicly identified as the suspect, the storm had passed. The local prosecutor announced that he lacked the evidence to charge Mr. Winston with rape. The quarterback would go on to win the Heisman Trophy and lead Florida State to the national championship.

After a Florida State student accused quarterback Jameis Winston of rape, the police did not interview him or obtain his DNA. Phil Sears/Associated Press

In his announcement, the prosecutor, William N. Meggs, acknowledged a number of shortcomings in the police investigation. In fact, an examination by The New York Times has found that there was virtually no investigation at all, either by the police or the university.

The police did not follow the obvious leads that would have quickly identified the suspect as well as witnesses, one of whom videotaped part of the sexual encounter. After the accuser identified Mr. Winston as her assailant, the police did not even attempt to interview him for nearly two weeks and never obtained his DNA.

The detective handling the case waited two months to write his first report and then prematurely suspended his inquiry without informing the accuser. By the time the prosecutor got the case, important evidence had disappeared, including the video of the sexual act.

“They just missed all the basic fundamental stuff that you are supposed to do,” Mr. Meggs said in a recent interview. Even so, he cautioned, a better investigation might have yielded the same result.

The case has unfolded as colleges and universities across the country are facing rising criticism over how they deal with sexual assault, as well as questions about whether athletes sometimes receive preferential treatment. The Times’s examination — based on police and university records, as well as interviews with people close to the case, including lawyers and sexual assault experts — found that, in the Winston case, Florida State did little to determine what had happened.

“How long does it take to identify a freshman football player – about 10, 15, 16 seconds?”

William Meggs

Prosecutor

University administrators, in apparent violation of federal law, did not promptly investigate either the rape accusation or the witness’s admission that he had videotaped part of the encounter.

Records show that Florida State’s athletic department knew about the rape accusation early on, in January 2013, when the assistant athletic director called the police to inquire about the case. Even so, the university did nothing about it, allowing Mr. Winston to play the full season without having to answer any questions. After the championship game, in January 2014, university officials asked Mr. Winston to discuss the case, but he declined on advice of his lawyer.

When The Times asked Mr. Winston for an interview, an Atlanta lawyer advising his family, David Cornwell, responded, “We don’t need an investigation, thorough or otherwise, to know that Jameis did not sexually assault this young lady.” Mr. Cornwell, who has represented major sports figures and the N.F.L., added, “Jameis has never sexually assaulted anybody.”

Mr. Winston has previously acknowledged having sex with his accuser but said it was consensual. His account has been supported by two friends from the football team who were with him that night, Chris Casher, who took the video, and Ronald Darby.

A month before the rape accusation became public, the university’s victim advocate learned that a second woman had sought counseling after a sexual encounter with Mr. Winston, according to the prosecutor’s office. The woman did not call it rape — she did not say “no.” But the encounter, not previously reported, “was of such a nature that she felt violated or felt that she needed to seek some type of counseling for her emotions about the experience,” according to Georgia Cappleman, the chief assistant state attorney, who said she had spoken with the advocate but not with the woman.

The victim advocate was concerned enough about the episode to have alerted Mr. Winston’s first accuser.

Ms. Cappleman said that based on what she was told, a crime had not been committed. Nonetheless, Ms. Cappleman said she found the encounter troubling, because it “sheds some light on the way Mr. Winston operates” and on what may be “a recurring problem rather than some type of misunderstanding that occurred in an isolated situation.”

Mr. Cornwell called her comments “out of bounds,” adding, “I’m not interested in a prosecutor expressing an opinion based on a personal moral compass.”

How Long It Took to Gather Key Evidence
Investigators showed little interest in finding out what happened. They delayed talking to witnesses, interviewing Mr. Winston and collecting his DNA.

2012
2013

Nine months pass

Dec. 7

Accuser tells police: A Florida State University student told police she was raped that morning after drinking at Potbelly’s, a popular local bar.

Jan. 10

34 days Identify Mr. Winston: Police failed to identify Mr. Winston, learning his identity only after the accuser recognized him on campus and told police.

Jan. 23

47 days Contact Mr. Winston: Tallahassee police investigators waited nearly two weeks before trying to contact Mr. Winston.

Feb. 11

66 days Close case: Scott Angulo, the lead investigator, filed his first report, closing the case without interviewing crucial witnesses or getting DNA or phone records from Mr. Winston.

Nov. 14

342 days Interview key witness: For the first time, investigators interviewed a football player who witnessed sex between Mr. Winston and the accuser.
Obtain DNA sample: Investigators obtained Mr. Winston’s DNA that matches DNA found on the accuser's clothing.

Dec. 5

363 days No prosecution: The local prosecutor William N. Meggs decided the evidence was not sufficient to prosecute Mr. Winston.

The university, after initially speaking with The Times, recently stopped doing so. A university spokeswoman, Browning Brooks, said she could not discuss specific cases because of privacy laws but issued a statement, saying that the university’s “code of conduct process has worked well for the vast majority of sexual assault cases” and has “provided victims with the emotional and procedural help they need.”

On Feb. 13, before the university stopped granting interviews, Rachel Bukanc, an assistant dean who oversees student conduct issues, said she knew of no student who had secretly videotaped sex. After The Times questioned that response, the university began an inquiry and recently charged Mr. Casher with a student-code violation for taking the video. Mr. Darby has also been cited in connection with the episode.

It would be difficult to overstate the importance of football to Florida State and its hometown. In Tallahassee, rooting for the Seminoles is a matter of identity and economy. The 2013 championship season generated millions of dollars for the athletic department and city businesses, and favorable publicity beyond measure.

Patricia A. Carroll, a lawyer for Mr. Winston’s accuser, said the police investigator who handled the case, Scott Angulo, told her that because Tallahassee was a big football town, her client would be “raked over the coals” if she pursued the case.

Officer Angulo has done private security work for the Seminole Boosters, a nonprofit organization, with nearly $150 million in assets, that is the primary financier of Florida State athletics, according to records and a lawyer for the boosters. It also paid roughly a quarter of the $602,000 salary of the university president, Eric Barron, who was recently named president of Penn State.

The Tallahassee police declined to make Officer Angulo available for an interview, but his report states that he suspended the investigation because the accuser was uncooperative, which she denies.

The department issued a statement, saying that police reports in the Winston case “document that our department took the case seriously, processed evidence and conducted a thorough investigation based on information available when the case was reported.”


The case came at a time of turmoil for the Tallahassee police. In March 2013, a grand jury investigating police misconduct in an unrelated matter called police supervision “careless, uncaring, cavalier and incompetent.” The grand jury said supervisory deficiencies were so deeply ingrained that the city police, which has more than 350 sworn officers, should merge with the sheriff’s department, with the sheriff assuming overall control.

Late last year, Mr. Winston’s accuser and another Florida State student filed internal-affairs complaints, charging that Tallahassee police officers had investigated them, rather than the accused, and then prematurely dropped their cases.

“My attorney’s repeated calls to Tallahassee Police Department prove that I had not dropped the case,” Mr. Winston’s accuser wrote in her Dec. 19 complaint.

Two days earlier, the other student had written, “Why did the detective insist my case was closed and refused to answer calls and emails?” She added, “I am SO ANGRY!”

Both complaints were quickly dismissed.

Purgatory at Potbelly’s

Potbelly’s, where the accuser was drinking, operates more than 30 security cameras. Leslye Davis/The New York Times

Potbelly’s is a classic campus bar: big and boisterous, a place to drink, dance and mingle inside or at a tiki bar outside. A Thursday tradition, Purgatory at Potbelly’s, allows students to drink all the alcohol they want for $10 from 9 p.m. to midnight.

On Purgatory Thursday, Dec. 6, 2012, Mr. Winston’s accuser, who at 19 could not legally buy alcohol, shared at least five mixed drinks with friends, according to police records. At one point, a man she did not know grabbed her arm, pulled her close and introduced himself as Chris, a football player. He said he was looking for his roommate, and when he requested her phone number, she gave it to him. She did not recall seeing him again that night.

The woman did not appear drunk, her friends said. But after a stranger gave her a drink, she recounted, her memory became hazy and fragmented. Soon, she found herself in a taxi with three unfamiliar men, all of whom turned out to be Florida State football players.

Jameis Winston was one of them. A redshirt freshman quarterback, 6 feet 4 inches and 235 pounds, Mr. Winston had been a prize recruit, well-known in football circles but not yet a widely recognizable name.

Because of the young, combustible clientele, Potbelly’s protects itself by operating more than 30 security cameras. If something untoward happens, the cameras are there to record it. They were in position to fill in the blanks from that evening, recording how the woman came to leave without her friends, her general behavior and the face of the man who gave her the final drink.

Taxi records also contained a footprint for investigators to follow: The woman recalled that someone in the car swiped a Florida State student identification card to get a discounted fare.

After partially blacking out, the woman said, she found herself in an apartment with a man on top of her, sexually assaulting her. She said she tried unsuccessfully to push him away, but he pinned down her arms. Meanwhile, according to her account, another man walked in and told her assailant to stop. He did not. Instead, she said, he carried her into the bathroom, locked the door and continued his assault.

Afterward, the woman told investigators, the man put her on a bed, dressed her and drove her on a scooter to an intersection near her dormitory and dropped her off.

Upon returning to her room, she posted a plea online for someone to call her. Two friends did. One was Jenna Weisberg, another Florida State student.

“I was awake and I called her and she was hysterically crying,” Ms. Weisberg said. “‘I think I just got raped,’” she recalled her saying. Ms. Weisberg drove immediately to the friend’s dorm.

Ms. Weisberg said her friend was reluctant to call the police because she did not “want anybody to be mad at her.” Eventually she relented, and at 3:22 a.m., Ms. Weisberg called 911.

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A campus police officer responded, listened to the accuser’s account and then drove her to the hospital for a sexual assault examination. Because the woman believed the encounter occurred off campus, a city police officer, Clayton Fallis, interviewed her next.

Soon, Officer Angulo, an investigator with the special victims unit who joined the force in 2002, arrived at the hospital and took over the case. Again the woman began to recount what had happened, until the investigator, seeing she was tired, told her to go home and come to Police Headquarters later in the day.

Expand The student’s statement
She returned, accompanied by a friend, Monique Kessler, who was with her at Potbelly’s, and they recounted what they had seen and heard, including the encounter with Chris, the football player.

Officer Angulo had three solid leads to identify the suspect: the name Chris, the bar’s security cameras and the cab where a student identification card had been used.

What the investigator did next — or did not do — would later confound prosecutors and muddied the outcome of the case.

An Inquiry Begins, and Ends
Officer Angulo’s investigation was halting at best. His first report, filed more than two months after the encounter, includes no mention of trying to find Chris or looking at Potbelly’s videotapes.

Scott Angulo

Not only would Chris have been easy to find, but the police already had an investigative file that identified Chris Casher as Mr. Winston’s roommate. A little more than a week before the sexual encounter, the Tallahassee police had interviewed both men in connection with 13 damaged windows at their off-campus apartment complex, all caused by football players engaging in a long-running BB gun battle. The Florida State athletic department promised that the $4,000 in damages would be paid, and no charges were filed.


Officer Angulo did contact the cab company, without success. “The GPS units on the vehicles are not precise enough to eliminate enough cabs to focus the search,” he wrote.

He then asked the cab company to email all drivers who had worked that night, with “the demographics of the passengers and the pickup location.” No one responded, and there is no indication that he attempted to interview drivers.

Officer Angulo, who had told his superiors that he “had no real leads,” suddenly got a big one on Jan. 10, a little more than a month after the encounter. As a new semester was beginning, the accuser called to say she had identified the suspect — Jameis Winston — after seeing him in class and hearing his name called out.

Florida State quarterback Jameis Winston was with defensive end Chris Casher, right, on the night Mr. Winston was accused of rape. Phil Sears/Associated Press

Again, Officer Angulo hesitated. Nearly two weeks passed before his backup investigator contacted Mr. Winston — by telephone, records show.

“Winston stated he had baseball practice but would call back later to set a time,” Officer Angulo wrote. The police did get a response — from Mr. Winston’s lawyer, Timothy Jansen, who said his client would not be speaking to anyone.

With Mr. Winston identified, the next logical step would have been to quickly obtain his DNA. Officer Angulo decided against it. Ms. Carroll, the accuser’s lawyer, said the officer told her that testing Mr. Winston’s DNA might generate publicity. “I specifically asked and he refused,” Ms. Carroll said.

Officer Angulo concluded his six-page report by saying: “This case is being suspended at this time due to a lack of cooperation from the victim. If the victim decides to press charges, the case will be pursued.”


Two parts of that statement struck Ms. Carroll as strange. The officer, she said, never informed her client that he had suspended his investigation, and her client never said she would not cooperate. She said that while her client was indeed concerned about the prospect of pressing her case against a star-in-waiting, “at no time did we call him and tell him we don’t want you to do an investigation.” Her client, she added, simply wanted more information before deciding what to do.

Such reluctance should not keep the police from investigating, according to Ms. Cappleman of the prosecutor’s office.

“It makes the most sense to me, if somebody comes in to report a violent crime, investigate it, and we’ll talk about what to do with it after we’ve collected the evidence and have the most thorough picture,” she said. If an accuser later decides she does not want a trial, Ms. Cappleman added, her office might offer a suspect a better plea deal.

Patricia A. Carroll, a lawyer for a student who said she was raped by Mr. Winston, said she never told police to stop investigating the case. Steve Nesius/Reuters

Officer Angulo’s investigation apparently stirred no concern within his department. His superior officer signed off on his work, records show.

In the weeks that followed, not knowing the investigation had been suspended, Ms. Carroll called the police periodically to see if lab tests had come back. Sometimes, her calls were returned, she said, but not always.

A Deputy’s Daughter
Early last October, a 19-year-old Florida State student was studying on a Saturday night while her roommates went drinking. She said they returned drunk, and a roommate’s former boyfriend, also a student, raped her in her room.

The student reported the encounter to the Tallahassee police. The episode had nothing to do with Mr. Winston, but it, too, raised questions about how the city police deal with rape accusations. The police response was so inappropriate, according to the father, that later on, in a complaint filed with the police, he compared it to the Winston inquiry, which had recently drawn criticism in the news media.

The father, a part-time deputy sheriff in another county, said he was away on business when he called his daughter and found her crying and confused. With prodding, she disclosed that she had just spoken to the police about “a situation,” but would say no more. An officer had told her that “it might be better not to inform me,” her father said.

Alarmed, he asked his wife to call. She did, and their daughter said she had been raped. The mother and a family friend, also a law enforcement officer, immediately drove more than two hours to Tallahassee. They found the daughter with what appeared to be choke marks on her neck.

According to the father, a Tallahassee police officer named Christopher Pate characterized the young woman as confused and having had a hard time communicating. “Why was I not given an advocate to speak with?” his daughter said in a complaint she filed later with the police. “I was raped and was stressed and scared.”


In a report, Officer Pate said he had offered the woman “many different avenues of help (victim advocate, female officer etc.). She refused them all.”

Rape crisis counselors, while not speaking specifically about this case, say traumatized victims often experience memory problems. “Victims themselves feel like they are losing their minds when they can’t remember, when they remember fragments that don’t seem to connect up,” said Meg Baldwin, executive director of the Tallahassee-based Refuge House, a haven for victims of domestic violence and rape. “The interpretation so often is, well, she’s lying, she’s in any event an unreliable witness who won’t be believed.”

“The interpretation so often is, well, she’s lying.”

Meg Baldwin

Executive director of the Refuge House

Officer Pate’s blunt interviewing style did not help, the student said. “The first thing he asked me,” she recounted, “was if I was sure this was rape or if I just didn’t want a baby or wanted the morning after pill.” He also made comments, she said, “like, ‘Are you sure you want to file a report? It will be very awkward, especially for a female.’”

In his complaint to the police, the father wrote that Officer Pate had suggested that an investigation “would be futile, as ‘this kind of stuff happens all the time here.’” The family also said the police had focused more on the accuser than on the accused.

“From my perspective, T.P.D. demonstrated a poor initial response, poor investigative techniques and perhaps most importantly failed to support the victim of a violent crime,” the father said.


Unlike in the Winston case, the police did ask prosecutors to review the evidence, but they declined to bring charges because statements from the roommates conflicted with the accuser’s account. After receiving the family’s request for an internal affairs investigation, the police found no basis for punishment.

“While no policy violation was identified, Officer Pate was counseled on the public perception of officer actions and speech during investigations,” according to police documents. The department declined to make the officer available for an interview.

The woman, an A student, dropped out of school, left the city and underwent therapy for extreme depression, according to the family. “Going to F.S.U. had been a longtime dream for her,” her mother said.

The News Breaks
It was Wednesday of homecoming week last year and Florida State, ranked No. 2 in the nation with a 9-0 record, was preparing to play Syracuse. Mr. Winston, described by teammates as both playful and intense, had already thrown 26 touchdown passes, amassing 2,661 passing yards with a completion percentage just south of 70 percent. After his first game, an ESPN draft expert had identified him as a legitimate No. 1 choice in the 2015 N.F.L. draft.

If Florida State was going to ascend to the national championship game on Jan. 6, it would do so on the arm and poise of Jameis Winston. The Heisman voting was but a month away, and his crowning as America’s best college football player appeared all but certain.

Then, suddenly, that glorious vision began to go out of focus.

On Nov. 13, the Tallahassee police, responding to a public-records request from The Tampa Bay Times, released documents on the sexual assault case, setting off a frenzied scramble in the news media and prosecutor’s office to learn what had happened.

As the news broke, and before investigators could talk to them, Mr. Winston’s lawyer had the two witnesses, Mr. Casher and Mr. Darby, submit affidavits attesting to their recollection of that now-distant night. They gave similar accounts: A blond woman who was not intoxicated willingly left the bar with the three football players, they said, and joined Mr. Winston in his room. Because the door was broken and would not close, they looked in and saw the woman giving the quarterback oral sex.


At one point, Mr. Casher said, he entered the room, but the woman told him to leave, got up to turn off the light and then tried to close the door. At no time, both men said, did she appear to be an unwilling participant. (The men did not respond to phone messages, conveyed through university officials, seeking comment.)

Mr. Meggs immediately directed his staff to reinvestigate the case.

In the recent interview, Mr. Meggs said he was surprised that the police had not quickly found Mr. Casher. “How long does it take to identify a freshman football player — about 10, 15, 16 seconds?” he asked, adding, “Anybody that looked at this case would say you get a report at 2 in the morning, by noon you could have had the defendant identified and talked to.”

Why Officer Angulo had not asked to see the Potbelly’s security video is unknown. A Times review of sexual assault complaints handled by the campus police last year found that in one case, officers asked for the Potbelly’s video when they were trying to identify a suspected assailant who had been seen at the bar.

“I believe that Mr. Winston cannot be convicted. I don’t necessarily believe that he’s innocent.”

Georgia Cappleman

Chief Assistant State Attorney

As for not finding the taxi driver, “I am convinced that we would have identified the cabdriver that night and had an interview with him,” Mr. Meggs said. “Don’t know what we would have learned, but we would have learned the truth. I am also convinced that had it been done properly, we would have had the video from Potbelly’s.”

By the time the prosecutor asked for that video, the tape had long since been recycled.

Unlike the police, prosecutors said they interviewed every cabdriver they could find who had worked that night, but they turned up no new information. Mr. Meggs said that while his investigators probably spoke to the driver they were seeking, “at 11 months later, maybe he didn’t remember, maybe he didn’t want to remember.”

Mr. Meggs said he was shocked that the police investigator’s first attempt to contact Mr. Winston was by telephone. “He says, ‘I have baseball practice, I’ll get with you later,’” Mr. Meggs said. That call allowed Mr. Winston to hire a lawyer who told him not to talk.

“It’s insane to call a suspect on the phone,” Mr. Meggs said. “First off, you don’t know who you are talking to.” He said he would have gone straight to the baseball field. “If you walked up to Jameis Winston in the middle of baseball practice and said, ‘Come here, son, I need to talk to you,’ he would have said, ‘Yes, sir.’”

Mr. Meggs added: “He’s not in custody, you don’t have to read him his rights. He might have said, ‘I didn’t have sex that night.’”

Only after the prosecutor took over the case did the authorities obtain Mr. Winston’s DNA. It was a match to DNA found on the accuser’s clothing.

Belatedly, Officer Angulo and his backup were asked to conduct a crucial interview — to question Mr. Casher about the events of Dec. 7, 2012.

Mr. Casher made a startling admission: he had secretly videotaped part of the sexual encounter through the partly opened bedroom door, and deleted the video from his phone a couple of days later. Had the police found him quickly, they might have obtained that video.

Mr. Casher had never mentioned the video in the affidavit he submitted with the help of Mr. Winston’s lawyer. Even so, officers did not ask why he had omitted that important fact, why he had deleted the video or whether he had shared it with anyone. And though Mr. Casher said he had a new phone, the officers did not ask what he did with the old one.

• play

Neither the police nor the prosecutor’s office subpoenaed the phone records of Mr. Casher, Mr. Darby or Mr. Winston — even though they investigated all electronic communications to and from the accuser around the time of the sexual encounter.

The failure to seek similar electronic communications from the three football players surprised one former assistant state attorney, who prosecuted a Florida State football player on a rape charge a decade ago. “Why that was done, I don’t really know the answer to that,” said the former prosecutor, Adam Ruiz. “To me, that’s a no-brainer.”

“I don’t know why the DNA standards weren’t taken when they should’ve been taken.”

Adam Ruiz

Former Assistant State Attorney

Mr. Ruiz said his children, aged 7 to 21, all had iPhones, and even for something as mundane as rain: “You’re texting 30 people about it. I can’t imagine there would not have been something coming off that cellphone after the incident.”

Three weeks after it began, with evidence lost and memories faded, the state attorney’s investigation was over.

“I have personal concerns about what happened in that room that night,” Ms. Cappleman said, “but that’s completely separate from whether I’m able to prove a crime occurred.”

The University’s Role
The news that Mr. Winston had been accused of rape moved through campus like an electric charge. On social media, the discussion quickly lost any semblance of civility, prompting one female student to send an email expressing her anger to Mary Coburn, vice president for student affairs.

“All day every day I am bombarded with messages of hatred for the alleged victim,” the woman wrote. “I am sad and ashamed to be part of a student body that is quick to support a man who is accused of sexual assault, simply because he is a good football player, and even quicker to condemn the alleged victim of the crime as a liar.”

Ms. Coburn replied: “I agree with you and have been thinking about how we address the ugliness that has been circulating.” She promised to gather a group of students in January to discuss the problem.

The athletic department had known early on that Mr. Winston had been accused of a serious crime. According to an internal Tallahassee police email on Jan. 23, 2013, one officer wrote that Officer Angulo’s backup on the case “received a call from the Athletic Directors Assistant inquiring about the case.”


This knowledge should have set off an inquiry by the university. According to federal rules, any athletic department official who learns of possible sexual misconduct is required to pass it on to school administrators. Florida State declined to respond when asked if top officials, including the university president, had been informed of the encounter.

“Why did the school not even attempt to investigate the matter until after the football season?” said John Clune, another lawyer for the accuser.

His client filed a complaint with the civil rights office of the federal Department of Education, and the agency recently agreed to examine whether Florida State properly responds to sexual violence complaints. The inquiry was first reported by USA Today.

It was not just the Winston case that was causing concern on campus. In January, the mother of a student who said she had been sexually battered at a fraternity the previous April contacted the campus police asking why the university “doesn’t do more to protect women from rape,” records show. The police response was to inform the mother of a self-defense class for students.

That did not satisfy the mother, who told an officer, “The university should take a harder stand on the men who are identified as having committed rapes.” According to the campus police, the student had said she did not want officers to investigate the case.

Determining the extent of the problem is difficult, because so many students are reluctant to report sexual assaults. President Obama, in announcing the creation of a task force earlier this year to protect students from sexual assault, cited surveys showing that one in five women is a victim of “attempted or completed sexual violence” while in college.

“I’d like to see a higher reporting rate so that we can address the problem,” said Ms. Cappleman of the state attorney’s office. “A lot of these cases go unreported, so having a higher reporting rate will lead to a higher success rate of prosecution and hopefully a deterring effect.”

If cases are reported, the university is obligated to investigate, regardless of what the police do. According to the federal Education Department’s civil rights office, “a school that knows, or reasonably should know” about sexual harassment, including rape, “must promptly investigate to determine what occurred and then take appropriate steps to resolve the situation.”

Universities must also inform the federal government of reported sexual assaults on their property or in the immediate vicinity.

Florida State has not yet reported its 2013 sexual assault numbers, but in the three previous years it reported four, five and five. Those numbers place Florida State in the lower half nationwide of similar-size public universities, according to federal data analyzed by The Times. The number of reported rapes can be affected by the percentage of students who live off campus.

83

80

Reported forcible

sexual assaults

2010 to 2012

Reporting Sexual Assaults

60

Florida State University reported few forcible sexual assaults compared to similarly sized public universities.

40

20

14

2

California State

University-Fullerton

Florida State

University

University of

California-Berkeley

Note: Includes four-year public universities with total 2012 enrollments between 30,000 and 60,000 students.

Source: Department of Education

Ms. Baldwin, the Refuge House director, said accusers report that the university’s internal complaint system tends to bury their experience rather than address it responsibly. “When I compare F.S.U. with other universities within the last five years that have done a great deal to address this issue, I’m not seeing that level of energy here,” said Ms. Baldwin, a former Florida State law professor.

In its statement, the university said that, in complying with federal rules, “The need to investigate possible harassment must be balanced against the rights of and consent from the complainant.”

A decade before the Winston case, the inspector general found that Florida State had violated its policy when the athletic department failed to inform the campus police of a rape accusation against one of its standout football players. Mr. Ruiz, the former prosecutor who handled the case for the state attorney’s office, recalled that the coach at the time, the revered Bobby Bowden, attempted to convince him that a crime had not occurred. A jury eventually acquitted the player.

“I learned quickly what football meant in the South,” said Mr. Ruiz, who grew up in New York State. “Clearly, it meant a lot. And with respect to this case I learned that keeping players on the field was a priority.”

Kitty Bennett, Alain Delaquérière, Robert Gebeloff, Jo Craven McGinty and Ramsey Merritt contributed research.

Produced by Wilson Andrews, Josh Keller and Meghan Louttit. Videos by Leslye Davis.

© 2014 The New York Times Company

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/...e-allegations-against-fsu-jameis-winston.html

When I read that I was appalled and as I have said that whole things scream date rape drug.

I wouldn't touch this guy, between this and the other off field troubles (that we know about, how many have beed swept under the rug) what can you expect when he has millions in his hands?

The risk is too big.

 

[Memento]

Well I'm glad your not in charge. Because I hope we get Winston

I'm hoping for Kevin White, Josue Matias, and Gunnar Kiel myself.