Nifong: "Oops! My bad!"

No, not really. What Durham County District Attorney Mike Nifong actually said today was:

"To the extent that I made judgments that ultimately proved to be incorrect, I apologize to the three students that were wrongly accused."

Okay, let's play Spot The Equivocation:

(1) "To the extent that..." A classic. Right up there with "Insofar as...." Certainly no more than to that extent, whatever it may hypothetically be, though. After all, it only qualifies...

(2) "I made judgments..." And don't we all? What the heck? So Nifong's "judgments" were supposed to be supported by credible evidence, a respect for the law and the ethics of the profession and the integrity of the criminal justice system, but "judgments" has a nice distancing tone, doesn't it, as though those "judgments" did not amount to actions he took or ordered in his professional capacity as a prosecutor. And who can really hold him to blame when, after all, they were only...

(3) "ultimately proved wrong..." I mean, "ultimately," right? Not, oh, say, within a matter of days or weeks or even months of the investigation but only at the very end. The real problem, you see, is that those "three students" were ...

(4) "wrongly accused." Not wrongly charged by Nifong, mind you, but only wrongly accused. It isn't as though he might have made inflammatory comments to the press or possibly withheld exculpatory information from the defense along the way or dragged the whole damned prosecution out far longer than the credible evidence justified, you know. Oh, those pesky false accusers! What trouble they've caused!

Oh, yes, and Mr. Nifong also said this:

"It is my sincere desire that the actions of Attorney General Cooper will serve to remedy any remaining injury that has resulted from these cases."

I'll bet you do, Mike. I'll just bet you do.

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NON-GRATUITOUS ADDENDUM: When, I wonder, will we be seeing an equally defensive and weasel-worded attorney work-product purporting to be an apology from Duke University?

GRATUITOUS ADDENDUM:

Like the answer to New York Post columnist Andrea Peyser's question whether any evidence of contrition will be forthcoming from the New York Times after its shoddy and heavy-handed reporting in this case, the answer to future XM Radio personality Don Imus as to when Al Sharpton will be apologizing to the three former defendant Duke students is:

When Frosty the Snowman reigns in Hell.