Wednesday, February 21, 2018
DURHAM, N.C.
A North Carolina prosecutor gave up Tuesday trying to prosecute people charged with yanking a Confederate monument off its base after last summer’s white supremacist protests in Charlottesville, Va.
Durham District Attorney Roger Echols’s decision came a day after a judge dismissed criminal charges against two defendants and found a third not guilty. Trials for five others on misdemeanor charges were to be held later, but were likely to be plagued by problems identifying protesters on video.
“For my office to continue to take these cases to trial based on the same evidence, would be a misuse of state resources,” Echols said. “For that reason, I will dismiss the remaining charges against the remaining defendants.”
The toppling of the statue in front of a Durham County government building helped thrust North Carolina into a national debate on Confederate monuments in the aftermath of the protests in Charlottesville.
Associated Press