No fucking way (and speaking from me being innocent as I would never commit such a crime).
If I knew someone as being suspicious or something about the crime, I definitely would come forward with info.
Ghomeshi?
- Thread starter notthemama
- Start date
No fucking way (and speaking from me being innocent as I would never commit such a crime).
If I knew someone as being suspicious or something about the crime, I definitely would come forward with info.
They won't do that.
What about children that have been abused by priests? Many legit cases which would've been thrown out of court if not for an exception to the normal rules for limitation periods.
P.S. I just say Whitewaterguy's response. :thumb:
I don't see a parallel here with the O.J. case.
I believe the judge that reasonable doubt was established here, unlike what the bamboozled jury in the O.J. trial felt (I really think you have to be cognitively impaired if anyone thought O.J. didn't do it).
I'm surprised that your posts would reflect a negative impression of our court system. Perfect ? No ! But in a world in which the courts are used to repress and rail-road innocent people, I think we do quite well. If I had one fear of judgement in the Canadian system, it would be the jurors themselves in that they can be irrational, illogical and biased. I believe the Ghomeshi outcome was logical and correct. The accusers besides part of a joint conspiracy against Ghomeshi, perjured themselves and had a history of post event behaviour that indicated claims were more likely based on personal vengeance than factual events. If 60% of the Toronto population were on the jury - he would have been found guilty because of his character not the truth of the charges brought against him. That is what scares me about juries.
My take on the Ghomeshi uproar is that the people had set up Ghomeshi as their poster boy of violence against woman. Ghomeshi was to burn in effigy but with the charges dropped and an innocent verdict - there goes a valuable poster boy. That is why many are upset - they want their pound of flesh and guilt or innocence is not a factor.
There is not a any doubt in my mind that even more infuriating to the women that are upset with this verdict would be the knowledge that like Manson, Bundy and Bernardo convicted of murdering women, I'm guessing the Ghomeshi's dating opportunities just increased dramatically.
Sorry to disappoint you... :biggrin1:
We keep on saying that this system is the best we can do. But the truth is that it is the best that could have been done 250 years ago!
We can do better.... much better. It is just that we haven't tried. And the reason we haven't tried is that we believe this is the best we can do!
Perry
That is a huge question that deserves the attention of a Royal Commission of Inquiry rather than an answer from me.
But I think I can say this: (a) it must ensure that no innocents are convicted and no guilty are acquitted, and (b) it should incorporate state of the art technology.
Perry
Not just that, but the jail time should be EXACTLY the same as a rape conviction. If a woman is prepared to put a man in jail for 10 years with a lie, ruining his life, then she should face the same penalty if found guilty.
Agreed 100%
But it would have to be proven that it was a false allegation. Not just that it didn't result in a conviction.
I think it should apply to anyone who bears false witness. Like cops who have knowingly and deliberately lied under oath to try to convict someone.
Their penalty should be the same as the penalty that the person who was falsely accused would have been subject to.
I think a) is philosophically impossible and b) can be done without fundamental changes to our system.
No matter how good you make the system there will ALWAYS be cases where the evidence is simply lacking. You have to decide how to handle that--we have decided to presume innocence which lets some guilty people be acquitted.
The flip side should be possible. Since we presume innocence we ought to be able to ensure that no innocents are convicted. I think it is fair to say that every time one is, the system failed somehow. Whereas acquitting a guilty person may be the result of a lack of data.
So other than your philosophy, what is your argument, your evidence, your science? And what is your qualification for so saying?
And if you find it philosophically impossible, change your philosophy!
"Most of the things worth doing in the world had been declared impossible before they were done." Justice Louis Brandeis
Perry
I don't think you have a real answer for what to do when the evidence is simply lacking.
One thing you could do is what the Japanese do, which is have a much higher standard for charging people. They have a conviction rate around 99% because the police there don't charge you unless the case is a slam dunk.
The flip side is that while they achieve in a way what you want, fewer innocents found guilty and fewer guilty found innocent, they achieve that by failing to even charge a lot of guilty people, lots of yakuza guys walking around found serious crimes but the police don't act because some evidence is lacking. Is that better? And they still have wrongful cases.
If there isnt enough data to make a decision what do you do? You can't just say "science!" In most cases the data you need just doesn't exist no matter how you look for it, and there have been lots of convictions from faulty science (Motherisk, Charles Smith). It isn't a miracle answer.
I think that your quoting the Japanese legal system as a positive model with respect to the recent Ghomeshi verdict is simply asinine. Japan is a country which had democracy imposed on it by the Americans after their defeat, surrender and occupaton after World War II. However with respect to women's rights, Japan remains highly misogynist and women continue to undergo egregious violations of their human rights. Ghomeshi like behaviour is highly tolerated in Japan and he likely he would never have been charged in Japan let along gone to trial. Japan even recently outlawed child pornography due to international pressure! The accusers and their families in the Ghomeshi trial would have been ostracized by Japanese society let alone the legal system.
In the Ghomeshi trial some of the accuser according to the judge withheld evidence and perjured themselves repeatedly giving the judge no other choice than to aquit the accused. The Ghomeshi case has so many complications and introduces so many inconvenient truths about society and the legal system. It will be interesting to see how the June trial proceeds now, if at all.
Please - enlighten us with an example ! A Royal Commission of Inquiry is men & women who would be soliciting opinions - you are dissatisfied which I can only surmise you have an alternative in mind.
The only way I can see that you are going to ensure the guilt and/or innocence of a case based on circumstantial evidence is a mind probe if/when that becomes 'state of the art' technology. Other than that - I must side with Fuji regarding the impossibility of assuring a correct judgement - in fact - I would argue if such proof was a available a trial would be moot.
Re: "Most of the things worth doing in the world had been declared impossible before they were done." Justice Louis Brandeis A nice motivational quote that should not be interpreted to indicate there is no such thing as 'impossible'. I think wiping my ass, making coffee are worth doing but I never declared them impossible. However raising the dead (eg: Rob Ford) or travelling back in time to kill my father when he was a boy .... that's impossible.
