The Carol Stuart murder case may have been closed almost 10 years ago, but tempers still flare in Boston over the police investigation and media coverage that followed that crime.

Those tempers came out again at a panel discussion last night at Harvard Law School (HLS). "Revisiting the Stuart Case," was hosted by Climenko Professor of Law Charles J. Ogletree Jr.

On Oct. 23, 1989, Charles Stuart, who was white, claimed that a black man had shot him and his pregnant wife. After an extensive manhunt, William "Willie" Bennett, who is black, was arrested.

Three months after the shooting, Charles Stuart's brother produced evidence that Stuart had shot himself and his wife as part of a scheme to collect insurance money. Soon afterward, Charles Stuart committed suicide.

The case inflamed racial tensions in Boston, as the media and police were accused of being too easily duped by Stuart's story.

About 100 people met in the Ames Courtroom last night to hear the panel, which included the former and current Boston police commissioners and representatives from print, radio and television media.

The case would have been investigated by the police very differently if the victim had been a black woman and the suspect a white man, said panelist and Boston Globe Managing Editor Gregory Moore.

But Moore said that the media, and especially the Globe's own staff, went too far toward presuming Bennett's guilt.