It's obvious from reading your posts that you would rather have splinters shoved up your fingernails than admit you were wrong, but you are wrong here. You rely on nothing more than a vague SI article, full of erroneous statements. For example, the article states that Damon Benning was cited for assault for "allegedly beating" his ex-girlfriend. That's an utter falsehood. It was the ex-girlfriend who was cited for criminal mischief for vandalizing Benning's car and apartment.
Nowhere in the article does TO "admit" that he overstepped his bounds or confronted victims. There are plenty of alleged quotes from Gary Lacey arguing, somewhat obtusely, to that effect, but nothing like what appears to be your vague recollection.
As for your gun felony/misdemeanor assault issue, you are batting 100%. TW was charged with 2 felonies. After his request to have the fact-finder consider a self-defense claim was rejected by the trial court and his argument that the 2 statutes under which he was charged unconstitutionally overlapped was rejected by the trial court and appellate court (there's ol' TO skewing and bullying the courts into rejecting two of TW's potential defenses) the matter was plea-bargained. A completely standard plea-bargain was reached, where TW pled no-contest to a misdemeanor assault charge and the felony discharging a gun charge; 2 felonies plea-bargained to 1 felony and a mid-level misdemeanor. But that's when GL's fingers apparently got in the pie. TW was sentenced to 6 months in jail, which was completely unexpected. The standard for someone with a clean record like TW is minimal jail time, like 7-30 days, all suspended, and probation. Even the ADA stated that she was "completely shocked" at the sentence. The Packers assigned an attorney to the case to look out for their interests and according to him, he researched 5 years of relevant sentencing and didn't find a single instance where a defendant was jailed for an analogous conviction with an otherwise clean criminal record. Once again, TO bullying and skewing the judge into giving TW a unprecedentedly harsh sentence.
As for your argument that the political claims are unfounded and unnecessary, they are relevant to understand why GL stated things that were later proven to be untrue. In addition, they were well-known to those in the legal profession in Lincoln at the time. In fact, even several of the attorneys and paralegals I know who worked in the DA's office knew quite well that GL hated TO. It was hardly a secret. At the time, no one that I talked to knew why, or at least was willing to tell me why. It was only after GL retired a while back that someone fairly high up in the NE AG's office who knows GL told me it was because of strong political disagreement between TO and GL, leading to a curtailment of GL's political ambitions. Which makes sense, given that GL made it clear early on that he had his sights set on the governorship, at least, yet was stuck as the Lancaster County DA for his entire political career.
But all you have to do is look at the Riley Washington case to know that GL was after NU players and, through them, TO. The videotape evidence, ballistic evidence, and disinterested witness evidence all established that RW was not the shooter. The ballistic evidence and disinterested witness evidence all suggested that the shot came from the vicinity of a dumpster a number of yards north and a little west of where the victim and RW were standing. Coincidently, that is where the victim's 2 buddies admitted they were hiding. Throw in the facts that between the victim and his two witness buddies they had 4 misdemeanor and 1 felony conviction for filing false police reports against NU athletes, and the victim couldn't ID RW in 3 photo line-ups, and not surprisingly everyone in GL's office told GL to wait, if you take it to trial now you'll get creamed. But GL ordered an ADA to take it to trial and she got creamed. Now GL is a very astute attorney and smart political animal. To force a case to trial that was a guaranteed loser makes no sense unless there was some sort of hidden agenda.