Jameis Winston, FSU, Tallahassee PD: NYT Defrocks Florida Again

Four years ago it took a newspaper from New York City to show Floridians that U.S. Sugar and Charlie Crist were taking them for a ride on the Everglades land deal. Now the same newspaper -- the New York Times -- is back to tell us Tallahassee law enforcement either deliberately, perhaps even illegally, coddled FSU star athlete Jameis Winston, or the whole incompetent bunch of them embody Barney Fife amok in Mayberry.

Either way, however painful, Walt Bogdanich's stinging report in the Times Wednesday, "A Star Player Accused and a Flawed Rape Investigation," is a must-read. See for yourself, if you haven't already.

All kinds of wrongs were "committed" after a young woman claimed she was raped at a popular Tallahassee bar, Potbelly's, in December 2012 by Florida State University quarterback Jameis Winston.

According to the Times, there was virtually no investigation at all, either by the police or the university.

The police didn't follow obvious leads that would have quickly identified the suspect and witnesses, one of whom videotaped part of the sexual encounter. After the accuser identified Winston as her assailant, it took the police two weeks to interview him and they never obtained his DNA sample even though they were asked to do so.

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

Jameis Winston, whose pattern of party behavior is chronicled in the story, won the Heisman Trophy just as the investigation ended.

And here we are, left to lick our wounds. The New York Times made us famous again.