GhostofPotvin29
New member
He's just been found not guilty on all charges.
Jian Ghomeshi
- Thread starter mc
- Start date
Wasn't following this super closely or anything, but it sounded like a pretty standard sexual assault trial. And that's not a good thing.
GhostofPotvin29
New member
CarltonTheBear said:
Not sure what else could be done. The entire Crown case was based upon witness testimony and that requires the witnesses to be believable. They were shown numerous times to have lied or mislead the Court and so the Judge couldn't find their testimony credible enough to discharge the standard of guilt for a criminal matter. There was really no physical evidence, no 'smoking gun', it was all their credibility.
bustaheims
Active member
CarltonTheBear said:
No, it's most definitely not. A failure of the justice system here, for sure.
Potvin29 said:
Right... like I said, pretty standard sexual assault trial.
GhostofPotvin29
New member
CarltonTheBear said:
But what's the alternative?
Frank E
Active member
CarltonTheBear said:
I don't think it's usual for witnesses to be shown to be liars in these cases.
I think it's more that there often isn't enough physical evidence, and that it then comes down to a discrepancy of the events that transpired between the accusers and the accused.
L K
Active member
bustaheims said:
I know him personally and through others via the music industry/CBC and while I certainly think he's guilty (based on my own interactions/stories) I don't think it's really true that it's a failure of the justice system. Really it's a failure of the prosecution and the accusers in their ability to put together a solid case.
They had two primary witnesses/victims who were repeatedly caught in lies in their testimony and that was stuff that was outside of the realm of witness badgering. It was really fundamental stuff that the prosecution needed to have clarified and resolved well before this went to trial and they didn't.
I think this case turns in the other direction had the credibility of the witnesses not taken a beating repeatedly. As much as I feel for the women who have interacted with Ghomeshi, I don't think I'm comfortable with a justice system that slaps sex offender convictions on people when the prosecution has a piss poor case.
Potvin29 said:
A 26-year old with a Humanities degree isn't going to fix a serious issue within the criminal justice system. I can recognize there's a massive problem with all this without needing to provide an alternative.
GhostofPotvin29
New member
CarltonTheBear said:
I don't know if you can recognize that without an intimate knowledge of the courts, to be honest. From what I've seen following this there is a lot of basic, fundamental knowledge that people don't know about the criminal justice system or about even the Charter.
Potvin29 said:
I genuinely don't know what you mean by this. Nobody is confused by the concept of proof beyond a reasonable doubt. The problem is when it goes up against a crime that's almost impossible to prove beyond a reasonable doubt. Rape cases almost always end up being he-said-she-said. Physical evidence generally doesn't even mean anything. It can prove two people had sex but it often can't prove what was going on in the minds of the two individuals when it happened. One person says that it was rape and the other says that it was consensual.
You don't see any issue with that type of system? You want an alternative? The saddest thing about all of this is that there might not be one.
louisstamos
Active member
And it's even muddled that you can consent to sex, but not all sex acts - which I think was the case with many of the plaintiffs in the Ghomeshi case. They consented to sex with Jian, but did not consent to the BDSM stuff he imposed on them. (which I think was his original defense after he was fired, right? "Oh, I'm being villainized just because I'm into kinky stuff")
I don't know - it's a bit of a let down today, and it pains me that a lot of women heard the verdict, shrugged their shoulders, and said "of course he was." But I don't know what you can do - impose something to the effect of Dave Chapelle's "Love Contract?"
I don't know - it's a bit of a let down today, and it pains me that a lot of women heard the verdict, shrugged their shoulders, and said "of course he was." But I don't know what you can do - impose something to the effect of Dave Chapelle's "Love Contract?"
Lucy DeCoutere, a captain in the Royal Canadian Air Force and one of the victims who took the stand, gave a one-on-one interview with Chatelaine:
http://www.chatelaine.com/news/exclusive-lucy-decoutere-on-the-ghomeshi-disaster/
Gives her thoughts on the trial and her thoughts on the notes and e-mails that she sent to Ghomeshi after the incident.
http://www.chatelaine.com/news/exclusive-lucy-decoutere-on-the-ghomeshi-disaster/
Gives her thoughts on the trial and her thoughts on the notes and e-mails that she sent to Ghomeshi after the incident.
Another one, probably last one for now: https://nowtoronto.com/news/theatre-of-the-absurd-is-more-like-it/
Looks a bit at why these rape victims were caught in these so-called lies. These witnesses are being called liars because they forgot if they had hair extensions at the time of the events, or because they couldn't remember if Ghomeshi choked them with 1 hand or 2 hands, or if Ghomeshi pushed her to the ground or pulled her down by her hair. The Crown painted these as lies that the witnesses were telling in order to deceive the court. When in reality they were far more likely just mistakes that humans can make when under tremendous amounts of pressure. Nevermind the fact that they're being expected to recount things that happened 10+ years ago.
Then of course there's the stuff about them contacting Ghomeshi afterward. I have no idea why a rape victim would do something like that, but I've never been raped. This article touches on the idea that it's not exactly unusual for that to happen afterward, and I've read a number of accounts from people in their shoes that say the same thing. People don't often act like you think they would post any kind of assault or after any kind of traumatic experience.
It's so easy for us to sit here and say "If I was raped I would have told the truth and nothing but the truth" or "If I was raped I would have never withheld information" or "If I was raped I would have came forward right away" or "If I was raped I would never have spoken to my assailant afterward". But none of that is that simple.
Looks a bit at why these rape victims were caught in these so-called lies. These witnesses are being called liars because they forgot if they had hair extensions at the time of the events, or because they couldn't remember if Ghomeshi choked them with 1 hand or 2 hands, or if Ghomeshi pushed her to the ground or pulled her down by her hair. The Crown painted these as lies that the witnesses were telling in order to deceive the court. When in reality they were far more likely just mistakes that humans can make when under tremendous amounts of pressure. Nevermind the fact that they're being expected to recount things that happened 10+ years ago.
Then of course there's the stuff about them contacting Ghomeshi afterward. I have no idea why a rape victim would do something like that, but I've never been raped. This article touches on the idea that it's not exactly unusual for that to happen afterward, and I've read a number of accounts from people in their shoes that say the same thing. People don't often act like you think they would post any kind of assault or after any kind of traumatic experience.
It's so easy for us to sit here and say "If I was raped I would have told the truth and nothing but the truth" or "If I was raped I would have never withheld information" or "If I was raped I would have came forward right away" or "If I was raped I would never have spoken to my assailant afterward". But none of that is that simple.
bustaheims
Active member
CarltonTheBear said:
It's actually not as hard to understand as it seems. In a lot of cases of sexual assault/abuse, the victim initially feels like they're the one to blame or that they did something wrong, etc. Since, in the majority of cases, the victim has a pre-existing relationship with their attacker, they don't necessarily see a reason to break off contact immediately because they haven't placed the blame on their attacker.
bustaheims said:
All very good points. I think more what I meant was that for most people you really can't truly, fully understand all of those points unless it's actually happened to you. For instance yes I can understand that often the victim feels like they're the one to blame... but I can't really explain why they feel that way.
CarltonTheBear said:
Just because you can understand something doesn't make it the right course of action. They were asked to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth in a case that relied on credibility. The crown prosecutor was a seasoned lawyer - I think he believed the complainants, and I think he complainants were possibly naive when coming up against the system.
When they failed to disclose what actually happened and having accounts change on multiple occasions then testimony does not hold up to the high standards of the law. What people seem to forget is that an accused is innocent until proven guilty and the burden of proof lies with the complainant to prove that something happened, not the other way around, which many seem to think is the case. People said he should have been forced to take the stand. Well, when the burden of proof is on the accuser I can't see why he should be forced to defend himself against the charge if the case against him is poor.
hockeyfan1
New member
The how and the why: what led to to Judge Horkins' conclusion...
Judge William Horkins, in a searing rebuke of the complainants, said that their "deceptive and manipulative" evidence raised a reasonable doubt in the guilt of Ghomeshi.
"The harsh reality is that once a witness has been shown to be deceptive and manipulative in giving their evidence, that witness can no longer expect the court to consider them to be a trusted source of the truth," Horkins said.
I am forced to conclude that it is impossible for the court to have sufficient faith in the reliability or sincerity of these complainants. Put simply, the volume of serious deficiencies in the evidence leaves the court with a reasonable doubt."
Horkins added that while the evidence in the case raises a reasonable doubt, it "is not the same as deciding in any positive way that these events never happened."
The first woman to testify told court that Ghomeshi had pulled her hair and punched her in the head at his home after a dinner date. DeCoutere said the former Q host had choked and slapped her at his home. The third woman said Ghomeshi had squeezed her neck and covered her mouth while they were kissing on a park bench.
But it was later revealed in court that each woman had had contact with Ghomeshi following the alleged assaults and that details of this contact had not been provided to police or the Crown in their initial statements.
The first witness had told police and the court she had no subsequent contact with Ghomeshi after two alleged attacks but later acknowledged she sent him two emails and a picture of herself in a bikini more than a year later. The woman said she sent the emails to bait Ghomeshi into calling her to explain his actions.
"I suppose this explanation could be true, except that this spontaneous explanation of a plan to bait Mr. Ghomeshi is completely inconsistent with her earlier stance that she wanted nothing to do with him, and that she was traumatized by the mere thought of him," Horkins said.
DeCoutere had told the court that she had no romantic interest in Ghomeshi after her alleged assault and only saw him at industry functions. But it was later revealed in court that hours after the alleged sexual assault, she had sent him an email saying she wanted to have sex with him and sent him a handwritten letter days later saying she was sad they didn't spend the night together.
"I find as a fact that Ms. DeCoutere attempted to mislead the court about her continued relationship with Mr. Ghomeshi," Horkins said. "It was only during cross-examination that her expressed interest in a continuing close relationship was revealed."
Horkins said her disclosure of this fact just before she was set to testify showed that she was clearly "playing chicken" with the justice system. He said she "was prepared to tell half the truth for as long as she thought she might get away with it," had been following the proceedings more closely than admitted, "and she knew that she was about to run head first into the whole truth."
Crown attorney Michael Callaghan argued that the complainants had provided explanations for some of the inconsistencies, delayed disclosures or omissions in their evidence.
Ghomeshi's lawyer seized on those omissions, saying their testimony was "so riddled with inconsistencies and improbabilities and proven lies under oath that it cannot be said to prove anything."
Horkins concurred.
"Each complainant was confronted with a volume of evidence that was contrary to their prior sworn statements and their evidence," he said. "Each complainant demonstrated, to some degree, a willingness to ignore their oath to tell the truth on more than one occasion. It is this aspect of their evidence that is most troubling to the court."
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/jian-ghomeshi-sexual-assault-trial-ruling-1.3505446
Judge William Horkins, in a searing rebuke of the complainants, said that their "deceptive and manipulative" evidence raised a reasonable doubt in the guilt of Ghomeshi.
"The harsh reality is that once a witness has been shown to be deceptive and manipulative in giving their evidence, that witness can no longer expect the court to consider them to be a trusted source of the truth," Horkins said.
I am forced to conclude that it is impossible for the court to have sufficient faith in the reliability or sincerity of these complainants. Put simply, the volume of serious deficiencies in the evidence leaves the court with a reasonable doubt."
Horkins added that while the evidence in the case raises a reasonable doubt, it "is not the same as deciding in any positive way that these events never happened."
The first woman to testify told court that Ghomeshi had pulled her hair and punched her in the head at his home after a dinner date. DeCoutere said the former Q host had choked and slapped her at his home. The third woman said Ghomeshi had squeezed her neck and covered her mouth while they were kissing on a park bench.
But it was later revealed in court that each woman had had contact with Ghomeshi following the alleged assaults and that details of this contact had not been provided to police or the Crown in their initial statements.
The first witness had told police and the court she had no subsequent contact with Ghomeshi after two alleged attacks but later acknowledged she sent him two emails and a picture of herself in a bikini more than a year later. The woman said she sent the emails to bait Ghomeshi into calling her to explain his actions.
"I suppose this explanation could be true, except that this spontaneous explanation of a plan to bait Mr. Ghomeshi is completely inconsistent with her earlier stance that she wanted nothing to do with him, and that she was traumatized by the mere thought of him," Horkins said.
DeCoutere had told the court that she had no romantic interest in Ghomeshi after her alleged assault and only saw him at industry functions. But it was later revealed in court that hours after the alleged sexual assault, she had sent him an email saying she wanted to have sex with him and sent him a handwritten letter days later saying she was sad they didn't spend the night together.
"I find as a fact that Ms. DeCoutere attempted to mislead the court about her continued relationship with Mr. Ghomeshi," Horkins said. "It was only during cross-examination that her expressed interest in a continuing close relationship was revealed."
Horkins said her disclosure of this fact just before she was set to testify showed that she was clearly "playing chicken" with the justice system. He said she "was prepared to tell half the truth for as long as she thought she might get away with it," had been following the proceedings more closely than admitted, "and she knew that she was about to run head first into the whole truth."
Crown attorney Michael Callaghan argued that the complainants had provided explanations for some of the inconsistencies, delayed disclosures or omissions in their evidence.
Ghomeshi's lawyer seized on those omissions, saying their testimony was "so riddled with inconsistencies and improbabilities and proven lies under oath that it cannot be said to prove anything."
Horkins concurred.
"Each complainant was confronted with a volume of evidence that was contrary to their prior sworn statements and their evidence," he said. "Each complainant demonstrated, to some degree, a willingness to ignore their oath to tell the truth on more than one occasion. It is this aspect of their evidence that is most troubling to the court."
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/jian-ghomeshi-sexual-assault-trial-ruling-1.3505446