This is a he-said, she-said case. There was presumably no other evidence than two completely conflicting stories. Anyone "corroborating" the girl's story was obviously lying, or offering testimony that could not have been material in determining this guy's guilt or innocence.

It's appalling really.





But yet, the fact that she presumably cannot be held legally responsible for testimony given at age 11 apparently had no bearing on the veracity or weight of the testimony she gave - double standard much? Talk about a horrible circle of anti-logic.


I honestly understand everyone's righteous (and it is righteous) indignation against sex offenders, especially those who commit those acts against children, but it takes a special lack of humanity to think that what went down here (if this story is indeed true) is just "OK" or "an unavoidable and necessary byproduct of the system".

 

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Uh people get convicted based on he said-she said all the time. I don't know what country you're living in but it apparently isn't America.

Yes, but that doesn't make it OK, or even tolerable.

 

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If you want to pass some constitutional amendment saying no one can be convicted without physical evidence go for it I guess.


Eyewitness testimony is one of the oldest and most established bases for a criminal conviction. I agree it is problematic for a variety of reasons but it's effective because people believe it.

The only "eyewitness" in this case was basically the plaintiff. It would be different if there were multiple other "eyewitnesses". However, in this case, any others that might have been were obviously lying... the article doesn't mention that there were others, and I don't know any of the details of the original case, so I can't say, but doesn't it give you the least bit of consternation or even pause to think that this guy was convicted, and you KNOW what happened to him during 11 years of prison, on that single fabricated testimony alone?

 

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He basically went to jail for being a crappy father. I'll hold off on the outrage.

 

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I see your point. However, you could easily turn that on its head. Doesn't NOT punishing this girl simply encourage more people to falsely accuse people of heinous crimes?

You can argue the merits of charging v. not charging, and there are indeed merits both ways, but what does the law say?

 

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Of course it does. Although if the problem is him getting buttraped in prison it seems like the problem is him getting buttraped in prison. Unlike most of you people I don't believe it's ok and cool that people get buttraped in prison, no matter what they did.


I am not sure what your emotional angst translates to in real terms, though. Are you suggesting as a matter of law victim testimony shouldn't be admissible? Or that it shouldn't be enough on its own to secure a conviction?

I don't think too many 11 year olds are going to see this story and think "oh! I'll do that too! And they won't punish me if I just wait 10 years and then confess on my own!"


It is really a pretty unique set of circumstances. The message sent by punishing her for finally coming clean and getting the innocent guy out is worse than the message sent by not punishing her.


It would be very different if she had been older at the time or if they had found out some other way.

I agree. Though it's more than being raped - which will happen daily or nearly so, and with potentially dozens of people. It includes being beaten repeatedly. It includes living under constant stress of knowing you're about to be gangraped AGAIN, after lunch, because when it happened after breakfast, the other guys didn't get a chance at you, or beaten to the point that you spend another 3 months in the infirmary, or that you may be crippled for life... now imagine the stress of living under those sorts of threats when you know you're innocent...





I think that until we can ensure that prisons aren't as violent as they are, that there should be sentencing restrictions or reviews for cases such as this when there is only he-said, she-said evidence. Perhaps separate prisons with essentially solitary confinement or at least sequestering and HEAVY guard watching what's going on at every minute. My friends who are COs tell me there's only so much that they can stop.

Until or unless America is prepared to deal with prisons like this, then maybe we need to consider how many fkn people we're putting into prison in the first place.

 

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