This is part 2 in a 3 part series of articles posted by the Evening News in Edinburgh Scotland.
Comments are italicized and in bold.
Shameful stain on justice system, or is the system working as it should?
The abysmal conviction rate in rape cases is a shameful stain on Scotland's proud criminal justice system.
Not even three per cent of allegations ends in a guilty verdict. That either means 97 per cent of people – the vast majority of them women – who cry rape are liars or there is something fundamentally wrong with the way the police and courts handle their claims.
Only a fool or the worst kind of misogynist would back the former.
Lets start here. Why is it not reasonable to conclude that, at least good portions of those claims are false, and therefore there are liars? The attempt to shame anyone who doesn’t agree with this point of view by branding them fools or misogynists, makes this not an article, but a gender driven fluff piece touting the standard Gender Feminists/Rape-Industrial-Complex line.
Lord Advocate Elish Angiolini has taken an impressive lead in challenging the failings. When she was Solicitor General she ordered a review of how sexual offences are prosecuted, and 50 recommendations are being implemented, including new specialist rape investigation teams and better training for those who deal with victims.
While review of procedure is a good idea, would it be a stretch to actually publish what those recommendations are?
The Scottish Parliament is also in the final stages of approving laws which will further tighten the law by bringing in new definitions for assaults and, crucially, making it clear that consent to sex must be given freely – and can be taken away at any time.
So, who will it be incumbent upon to prove that the consent is given freely? The defendant, or the prosecution? Based on the tone of the article, it will be on the defendant to prove innocence, not the prosecution to prove guilt.
The moves to protect women are to be applauded, especially given that in the Lothians last year only five out of 170 rape claims sent to prosecutors led to a guilty verdict. The quicker new tougher laws are in force the better.
But will it be enough? Last month Ann Robertson, a witness in a rape trial, was jailed overnight for fleeing the High Court when it all became too much for her. And last Friday cage fighter Edgar Kudzhoyan was jailed for just 30 months after being found guilty of raping a teenager.
So rather than look at the cases to see how many were blatantly false, or had no proof other than the word of the accuser, lets put new tougher laws in place to punish potentially innocent men.
As for Ann Robertson, I would imagine she was found in contempt of court, and that is why she was in jail overnight, not because she filed a rape report. And while I would agree that Edgar Kudzhoyan being imprisoned for 30 months is a light sentence for the rape of a teenager, how many innocent men have spent much more time in jail? The draconian way they are “toughening” up the laws, will likely result in more of that occurring, not less.
All of which suggests that a complete change of culture is needed before Scottish courts give rape victims the justice they deserved. A rethink on our laws on corroboration should be debated as part of that.
This last part is what will be covered in the 3rd article in this series. As they say in show business…… stay tuned.
Link:
http://edinburghnews.scotsman.com/rapeandthelegalsystem/Rape-convictions-39A-shameful-stain.5301165.jp
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18 comments:
I read on another MR board a couple years ago, that up to 90% of claims in Ireland are false. I wonder if that was drawn from a 10% conviction rate? I doubt it.
Don't make the mistake of assuming things in any given foreign country are comparable to America with regard to supportive environment for false or frivolous claims. For all we know, in Scotland it could be a standard manner of getting back at a guy, like say for a bad date. (in a somewhat different 'sense' than in the US).
p.s. apparently we are the "worst kind of misogynists"
p.s. anyone who writes an article with a headline like this wins the Orwell award, for the mentality of assuming there 'should' be more convictions, which is de facto endorsement for convicting possibly innocent guys.
p.s. anyone who writes an article with a headline like this wins the Orwell award, for the mentality of assuming there 'should' be more convictions, which is de facto endorsement for convicting possibly innocent guys.
Very well put Norm.
All false accusations are a stain on our criminal justice system.
" So rather than look at the cases to see how many were blatantly false, or had no proof other than the word of the accuser, lets put new tougher laws in place to punish potentially innocent men. "
This is the case regarding my case. Rather than seeing there was not only no proof that I had committed a crime but, that the "victim" committed perjury under oath at the preliminary hearing, the "woman's state" of Tennessee still saught to punish me.
This will tie the hand's of innocent men behind their backs and make them hapless victims of a misandric feminized crusade style witch hunt designed to destroy them.
Do the men of Scotland have nothing to say about this?
Two more reports of false rape accusations
http://www.countypress.com/stories/061409/loc_20090614015.shtml
http://www.jenningsdailynews.net/news.php?id=3386
"Not even three per cent of allegations ends in a guilty verdict. That either means 97 per cent of people – the vast majority of them women – who cry rape are liars or there is something fundamentally wrong with the way the police and courts handle their claims."
This is what happens to a society that goes.."hysterical". The truth gets "redefined", so no one really knows what the truth is anymore. The gender feminist/ law enforcement missinformation Alliance needs to be broken, Giving the public faulty and inflamatory missinformation (by a public funded agency) is a gross violation of the constitution, and beyong the constitutional "policing powers" that were given to law enforcement in this country.
This ""ALLIANCE"" has been brewing for around 20 years now, and society is reaping what it has sown. Young broken boys, hopped up un Ritalin, not leaving their x boxes, because it's the only safe place for them...in a society that has gone ""hysterical"".
The law enforcement / gender feminist missinformation Alliance has simply "redefined"... a false rape acussation as ??unfounded??, in order to keep the true percenmtages of false rape acussations from the public..AND THEN JUSTIFY THIS MISSINFORMATION BY SAYING "IT HELPS GIRLS MORE EASILLY COME FORWARD WITH THEIR RAPE ACUSSATIONS"...Which i say is further missinformnation, and only enables more,and more false rape acussations.
What happens to a society and a legal system, that keeps falselly acussing innocent men/boys of rape????
The boys who are under attack, escape the sick society, and run to ritalin, and other drugs, and the girls invariably fallow them. The gender feminist assault on the truth, is a sick perversion, and is showing it's first fruits in our boys.
Norm,
While I agree that it may not be indicative of how things are here, there are too many parallels to the U.S. and other western countries to completely ignore it. VAWA was a very good first step toward this same type of thing. And NOW wants to make any crime against women a 'Hate crime' (I always considered all crime 'hate crime', because you sure don't commit a crime against someone you love).
Thank you anon, for the links. They are shceduled for upcoming posts.
"Not even three per cent of allegations ends in a guilty verdict. That either means 97 per cent of people – the vast majority of them women – who cry rape are liars or there is something fundamentally wrong with the way the police and courts handle their claims."
Or maybe it just means that there wasn't enough evidence to establish proof beyond a reasonable doubt, so instead of lowering the bar and allowing innocent people to be convicted they preferred to let the guilty go.
In other words, the system worked the way it should.
And keep in mind that the vast majority of men who commit rape also commit other crimes. So if a guilty man goes free in a rape case he'll almost certainly be put away for something else later on.
Girls and women are not being raped behind every closed door in America, and Enableing false rape acussations is a perversion of justice,
Innocent men are being raped by the legal system.
Innocent men are not only being raped by the legal system but raped by the judicial and prosecutorial systems
It is like legalized murder
Meanwhile, women who murder their husbands often do get away with it, by claiming abuse.
Archivist,
As far as differences between the US and Europeean countries, I was not so much referring to differences in legislation and other official channels/bodies.
I mostly just meant the 'psychological' environment...say, how frivolous and care-free the Europeans are compared to Americans, how traditional insofar as how they view sex, etc. That's why I specifically mentioned the possibilty that maybe a false accusation is a 'standard' way of getting back at a guy. knowing that many or most such accusations e.g. parents finding out that a given teen female was lying and so admonishing her.)
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