False Duke lacrosse rape accuser Crystal Mangum released from prison after being convicted of murder: reports

The woman who falsely accused three Duke lacrosse players of rape and then murdered her boyfriend was released from prison in North Carolina on Friday, according to multiple reports.

Crystal Mangum, who has been in prison since 2013 accused of murdering Reginald Daye in 2011, left the North Carolina Correctional Institution for Women in Raleigh on Friday morning. He was serving a sentence of 14 to 18 years.

Mangum confessed to lying about being raped by lacrosse players in an interview on the independent media outlet “Let’s Talk With Kat” in December 2024.

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“I testified falsely against them saying they raped me when they didn’t, and that was wrong. And I betrayed the trust of many other people who believed in me.” Mangum said. “[I] “I made up a story that wasn’t true because I wanted validation from people and not from God.”

Mangum found herself at the center of a massive national news story when she originally accused the three Duke students of raping her while she was performing as a stripper at a lacrosse team party in March 2006.

The players he accused were arrested and the accusations even caused the team to have to cancel their season.

The players, David Evans, Collin Finnerty and Reade Seligmann, were eventually found not guilty. Still, Mangum was not prosecuted for perjury due to questions about her mental health.

But Mangum cannot be prosecuted for perjury now because the statute of limitations on perjury charges in North Carolina is only about two years.

The lead prosecutor in the case, Mike Nifong, was the Durham County district attorney at the time of the trial and was eventually disbarred in 2007 after it was revealed that he had failed to turn over DNA evidence that would have been helpful to the defense’s case.

The News reported at the time that Nifong said he was unaware that crucial evidence had not been turned over to the defense.

Mangum was charged with first-degree murder and two counts of burglary in March 2011. A year earlier, she was convicted of misdemeanors after setting a fire that nearly burned down her home with her three children inside.

In a videotaped police interrogation, she told officers that she confronted her boyfriend at the time, not Daye, and burned his clothes, broke the windshield of his car and threatened to stab him.

According to North Carolina Department of Corrections records, she was born on July 18, 1978, the daughter of a truck driver. She grew up the youngest of three siblings, not far from the house where she said she was assaulted in 2006.

In 1993, when she was 14, Mangum claimed to have been kidnapped by three men, taken to a house in Creedmoor, North Carolina, 15 miles from Durham, and raped. She said one of the men was her boyfriend at the time and was physically and emotionally abusive, seven years older than her.

Creedmoor Police Chief Ted Pollard said Mangum filed a report about the incident on Aug. 18, 1996, three years after the rapes allegedly occurred. However, the case did not proceed because the accuser retracted the charges for fear of losing her life, according to her relatives.

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Vincent Clark, a friend who co-authored Mangum’s self-published memoir, said he hopes people don’t rush to judgment, echoing one of the oft-cited lessons of the lacrosse case.

Clark said Mangum realizes he has mental health issues.

“I’m sad for her. I hope people realize how hard it is to be her,” Clark said.

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