FOX News reporter Megyn Kendall Opines Duke Accuser Not Raped, But Suffering From Pre-Menstrual Syndrome
Reported by Ellen - May 22, 2006
Just when I thought FOX News reporter Megyn Kendall couldn’t be any more biased toward the Duke Lacrosse rape defendants, she as good as declared on Hannity & Colmes tonight that no rape had occurred. And, despite the fact that Kendall seems to have no background in medicine or forensics, she concluded that the medical condition of the accuser after the alleged rape was probably “something like” premenstrual syndrome.
Kendall pretended to be objective as she told Alan Colmes about the medical report on the alleged victim. But after Kendall added one qualifying “according to defense sources,” she promptly launched into a one-sided evaluation that she didn’t even seem to have the credentials to make. “The (medical) report supposedly shows, according to defense sources, NO ABRASIONS, (her emphasis) NO TEARS, NO BLEEDING. What it did show was, quote, diffuse edema, which is SWELLING (said with disgust) and supposedly she reported that her breasts were tender when palpated and that her lower right quadrant was tender when palpated.” Kendall continued with a judgment that neither Colmes nor anyone else had asked her for. “You know that – some would argue – is not necessarily a sign of rape so much as a sign of premenstrual syndrome or something like that.” Is Kendall qualified to make a statement like that? According to the FOX News website, her background is in corporate law, not medicine nor forensics.
Colmes asked why the report said “injuries consistent with sexual assault?”
At that point, Kendall dropped all pretense of objectivity. “Because, Alan, picture this. I mean, the woman shows up. She’s got bruises on her body. I’ve seen them, myself, in the photos. They were on her before she gets to the party. Then she gets a couple of cuts on, like, her legs and her ankles during the party. You can see those, too, while she’s dancing, bleeding. So the nurse gets this woman with bleeding and bruises on her body. Then she sees swelling, you know, in the vaginal area and the woman is saying ‘I was raped.’ The nurse hasn’t seen those photos. The nurse has no information other than what the accuser gives her.”
Kendall’s recitation of “the facts” seems to be based purely on her own surmises. She seems not to have confirmed with the nurse as to whether or not that’s how the conclusion was made. Kendall didn’t even seem to think it worth noting that she hadn’t.
FOX News contributor Susan Estrich complained in a recent column that a common mistake of FNC critics is to confuse “reporters and anchors, who are paid to be objective and cover the news, and do so, with commentators and hosts, who are expected to put forward a point of view.” In fact, this is a common defense that FOX News employees make and it couldn’t be more bogus. If Megyn Kendall is being paid to be objective, than she would have been fired long ago – perhaps when she referred to one of the Duke defendant’s prior assault charge as “a minor offense,” or perhaps when she gratuitously told Colmes that David Evans’ protestation of innocence was “powerful” and “compelling.”
If neither of those qualified as blatant bias, tonight's statements certainly should.
