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    Race issue surfaces in Kobe Bryant rape case
    (Agencies)
    Updated: 2004-06-22 09:27

    Lawyers for Kobe Bryant want to ask prospective jurors in his rape trial their views on interracial dating, injecting race into the already highly charged case, prosecutors said on Monday.

    The issue surfaced as lawyers for both sides hammered out questions for jury selection in the Eagle, Colorado case against the NBA star.

    Bryant, who is black, is accused of raping a 19-year-old white woman last summer at a resort near Vail, Colorado where she worked and he was staying.

    "This was not a relationship. This was not a date," Deputy District Attorney Dana Easter told Judge Terry Ruckriegle as she argued against allowing the defense to ask potential jurors about their views on interracial dating.

    Bryant, 25, has pleaded not guilty to raping the woman last June 30.

    The defense has contended that the two had consensual sex in his hotel room where they talked and kissed before she said he raped her. Until now, the question of race had not figured prominently in the sensational case.

    Both sides on Monday told the judge -- who has not yet set a trial date -- that they would be ready by late August for jury selection to begin.

    On Monday, Ruckriegle also rejected an unusual jury instruction that Bryant's lawyers had requested that might have made it harder for prosecutors to secure a conviction.

    That instruction would have told jurors that police had failed in their duty to collect critical pieces of evidence from the crime scene that could have helped exonerate him.

    Bryant's lawyers have said police did a sloppy job of collecting evidence such as sheets and towels and the chair she said she was raped on from the hotel room that could have supported Bryant's defense.

    Ruckriegle said the defense could ask police officers who testify about the investigation, but rejected the request for a jury instruction. The judge said there is no indication that the particular items had they been gathered would have helped Bryant.

    "It was a long shot," Craig Silverman, a former prosecutor in Denver who is observing the case, said of the defense's attempt to get the instruction accepted.

    Bryant faces a prison term of four years to life if convicted at trial.

    The Los Angeles Lakers star may leave the team after becoming a free agent last week, although the Lakers are keen to retain him and can under league rules offer him more money than any other franchise.

    The Lakers were defeated last week by the Detroit Pistons in the NBA Finals, an upset that prompted the immediate dismissal of coach Phil Jackson. Star center Shaquille O'Neal has also demanded a trade.



     
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